(Ecofin Agency) - Egyptian gas company EGAS has launched what is considered to be the World’s biggest tender for liquefied natural gas (LNG) in an effort to secure 96 LNG shipments for 2017-2018, participants in the tender revealed.

An extra 12 optional cargoes were included in the tender, which EGAS may choose not to award, Reuters reports.

According to the trading sources, the payment period for suppliers has been extended from 90 days after the date of delivery to between 120 and 180 days.

Egypt, which was once an energy exporter, turned into a net importer in recent years, as a result of declining production and increasing consumption. This has made the government to ration gas supplies to industry, making some plants incapable of operating at full capacity.

Egyptian Oil Minister, Tarek El Molla (photo), has said that the country will increase the production of natural gas to 5 billion cubic feet per day during the 2017 and 2018 fiscal year when the giant Zohr field begins operation. According to him, Egypt will still increase its importation of gas to feed the rise in consumption. The Oil Ministry is making efforts to resolve the shortfall in production by accelerating the development of major gas finds with the aim of achieving energy self-sufficiency by 2020 or 2021.

By 2017, the Zohr offshore field, discovered by Italy's Eni in August 2015 with an estimated 30 trillion cubic feet, will be brought on stream. BP's northern Alexandria field is also expected to begin production next year, boosting supply further.

“Eni will begin producing about 1 billion cubic feet a day from Zohr at the end of 2017 and there is also the production of BP at around 450 to 500 million cubic feet a day. We're still looking to have (gas) production reach over 7.5 billion cubic feet in 2020-21, and this will allow us to achieve self-sufficiency,” El-Molla said.

The Zohr field is expected to produce 2.5 to 3Bcfpd upon reaching its peak production in 2019 as Egypt's domestic gas production is currently at 4.35 Bcfpd against consumption of around 5.2 billion, he said.

Anita Fatunji