August 31, 2003	Sunday	Rajab 2, 1424

MUSCAT, Aug 30: Oman’s top oil company will invest around two billion dollars in a massive expansion of its gas production operation over the next five years, the company’s managing director said in a report released on Saturday.

Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) chief John Malcolm said the project was the company’s “biggest outlay” in its gas business portfolio since developing a huge gas-processing plant at Saih Rawl, central Oman.

That plant provides feedback to the two-billion-dollar LNG (liquefied natural gas) plant in Sur, in the Sharkiya region.

This investment will enable us to build a third processing facility and a new 48-inch pipeline to Sur, he said.

It will also require the rapid development of the newly discovered gas fields of central Oman.

Oman, a small non-Opec oil producer, is said to have proven gas reserves of around 660 million cubic metres (22 trillion cubic feet), with potential reserves more than double that figure.

PDO, Oman’s premier oil company, produces almost 90 percent of the country’s total crude output. It is 60 per cent owned by the government, 34 per cent by Royal Dutch Shell, four per cent by Total and two per cent by Partex. —AFP