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Israeli gas companies to supply Jordan’s energy for next 15 years

The agreement stipulates that the Leviathan partners will supply the Hashemite kingdom with 45 billion cubic meters of natural gas over the course of the next 15 years, totaling at some $10 billion.

Israel’s Leviathan partners energy consortium will become the main supplier of energy to Jordan in the next 15 years, according to a new agreement signed Monday.

The dramatic deal was formed between two energy companies – US-based Noble Energy and Israel’s Delek Drilling – and Jordan’s Electric Power Company. Both companies hold the drilling rights of the Leviathan gas field off the coast of Israel.

The agreement stipulates that the Leviathan partners will supply the Hashemite kingdom with 45 billion cubic meters of natural gas over the course of the next 15 years, totaling at some $10 billion.

According to the export agreement, supply is to commence once the pipe from the reservoir to Jordan is in place, hopefully in 2019.

The agreement is the first sale using gas from Leviathan. The Leviathan reservoir is the largest ever discovered in Israel’s territorial waters; most of its gas supply is designated for export. This deal is for one tenth of the gas in the Leviathan field.

Jordan is in dire need of a new source of energy since Egypt, who was its previous main supplier, has stopped providing them with gas for energy.

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Israel’s Minister Yuval Steinitz, who is entrusted with the National Infrastructure, Energy and Water Resources portfolio, praised the deal as “an historic moment in which Israel has become an exporter of energy and natural gas for the first time.”

He added that he had no doubt that this deal will pave the way to signing deals with other countries in the region.

Delek Drilling CEO Yossi Abu hailed the “historic” deal and said developers of the Leviathan reservoir would pursue similar agreements with others in the region, including Egypt, Turkey and the Palestinian Authority.

Some thirty-five trillion cubic feet of gas have been found in Israeli waters, worth some $500 billion. This crucial discovery enables Israel to become energy-independent for the first time in history and has also turned Israel into a major player in the international energy-exporting market.

By: World Israel News Staff