Houston-based Noble Energy and the Israeli company Delek Drilling signed a 10-year deal to deliver gas to Egypt by pipeline beginning later this year. Rigas said he favored building a terminal in Cyprus connected to Israeli and Cypriot fields. Israel Natural Gas Lines has issued bonds worth US$142 million. “We’re talking about deepwater gas in the most volatile region in the world. The gas framework sets the price of natural gas at $6 per million BTUs, three times the level elsewhere in the world. Chevron shares on Tuesday were off 6 cents at $89.67 while Noble’s lost 4 cents at $10.65. The beach is no longer caked with sticky black tar, and a yellowish tinge on the horizon is gone.Guy Stansill, a 38-year-old vegetable farmer at the nearby Sdot Yam kibbutz who can see the plant’s chimneys from his kitchen window, hopes it’s for good. TEL AVIV — For decades, Israel was an energy-starved country surrounded by hostile, oil-rich neighbors.Now it has a different problem. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet is considering banning the import of gasoline and diesel cars starting in 2030 and gradually switching to vehicles fueled by compressed natural gas or electricity.Israel is also stepping up exports to neighbors like Jordan and Egypt. Some of that fuel may be re-exported from two Egyptian terminals.Energy executives say they are optimistic that Egypt’s growing population, now 100 million, will make it a big market, and that gas can bring the two neighbors closer even as Egypt, with its own recent large-scale finds, becomes a bigger producer.The importance of the Egyptian market was underscored by a trip to Cairo in January by Mr. Steinitz, the first official visit by an Israeli minister since the 2011 unrest that shook the Arab world. Israel Natural Gas Lines Ltd. ("INGL") is a government-owned corporation, established in 2003 for the construction and operation of the national natural gas transmission system. The $5 billion deal would boost Chevron’s U.S. shale oil holdings and give it vast natural gas holdings off the coast of Israel. That project has the support of the European Union, Cyprus and Greece, but investors are reluctant to invest the estimated $6 billion to $7 billion it would cost.“There is a question mark on the financials of this pipeline and the returns for its shareholders,” said Mathios Rigas, chief executive of Energean, a Greek energy company that produces gas off Israeli shores.Mr. Earlier this year, the energy ministers from Israel and Egypt announced Israeli natural gas exports to Egypt. “We have so much sun,” she said. In 2004, the Minister of Energy awarded INGL a license for said purposes for 30 years, pursuant to the Natural Gas Sector Law. A gas pipeline between the countries was sabotaged in 2012.Israel could seek to sell gas to Asia, where demand is growing, but public opposition has blocked plans for an export terminal on the small, densely populated shoreline.Israeli policymakers long favored a proposal to build a pipeline to Europe through Turkey.
The Leviathan gas field is a large natural gas field located in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Israel, 47 kilometres south-west of the Tamar gas field. The alternatives to Chevron were either “high risk” or “did not result in any material benefit,” according to the filing. Consequently, additional exploration for gas off Israel's coastline is continuing.List of Natural gas-fired power stations in Israel: The country has imported 59 such buses from China, and has ordered another hundred or so.But because it has a small industrial base and its residential use of gas is limited because of mild winters, Israel needs to export more to take advantage of its energy bounty.Last year Noble and the Israeli company Delek Drilling signed a 10-year deal to deliver gas to Egypt by pipeline beginning later this year. The company denied Chevron an opportunity to visit the Leviathan facility in February, but weeks later agreed to a confidentiality agreement to begin discussing their operations in the region, according to the filing. Environmentalists say the country could do better.The Leviathan field, Israel’s largest, will be connected to the mainland by pipeline by the end of the year, and that should speed the use of gas in transportation, which has been minimal so far. Last year, Noble sought a partner to help finance the multibillion-dollar investment required for Leviathan, according to Tuesday’s Securities and Exchange Commission filing. Reporting by Gary McWilliams; Editing by Chris Reese and David GregorioFILE PHOTO: A Chevron gas station sign is shown in Cardiff, California, in this January 25, 2016 photo. Some experts say new discoveries could double that.As a result, Israel is phasing out diesel and coal-fired electricity, replacing it mostly with gas-fired generation and some solar power. (This August 11 story corrects paragraph 8 to say Chevron dropped a force-the-vote provision during negotiations instead of “Noble dropped”) HOUSTON (Reuters) - Chevron Corp’s $5 billion offer to acquire Noble Energy emerged after the U.S. oil major first proposed taking a stake of at least 50% in Noble’s Eastern Mediterranean natural-gas fields, a proxy filing on Tuesday showed.
Tamar Field. The switch to gas has helped clear the air in cities like Tel Aviv and Haifa that have converted diesel-fueled plants.Israel’s biggest coal plant — in Hadera, a coastal city — will be converted over the next three years, cutting national coal consumption by 30 percent. “Why use gas at all?”Israeli officials acknowledge that the gas will compete with cleaner solar energy. So, we’ll be left with the present.
Israeli state-owned natural gas transmission company Israel Natural Gas Lines Ltd. (INGL) is promoting a plan to set up a new terrestrial gas pipeline to compete with the duopoly of Tel Aviv-listed gas company Delek Group and Texas-based Noble Energy Inc., according to several people familiar with the matter who spoke to Calcalist on condition of anonymity. Israel Natural Gas Lines, the leader in natural gas distribution in Israel, stands ready to face the challenges of tomorrow. The Company distributes natural gas to retail and institutional customers. He and representatives of five other Mediterranean countries and the Palestinian Authority had met to form an association to coordinate regulations on gas pipelines and trading.Still, officials acknowledge that doing business with Egypt is risky.