"Just as we were the first to bring competition into Israel's gas market, so we want to now provide innovation to the gas and oil business," Energean CEO Mathios Rigas told the Globes 2023 Energy Conference in Tel Aviv yesterday evening.
The British-Greek company, which is traded on the London Stock Exchange and the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange has the production rights for the Karish, Tanin and Olympus, Israeli offshore gas fields. Rigas founded the company, which mainly works in the Eastern Mediterranean, in 2007. The company currently has a market cap of £2 billion.
Energean purchased the rights of the Karish and Tanin gas fields following the government's gas outline plan to increase competition in Israel's natural gas production sector and reduce the price that businesses and households pay for natural gas. Energean bid the lowest price, signed a long-term gas supply contract and is considered responsible for lowering prices for Israeli consumers.
Zero net emissions
Rigas pointed out that Israeli innovation can serve, "To push the industry forward to the vision of zero net emissions. We want to examine solutions on how to make the technology involved in our businesses safer and more successful. Of course, our aim is to generate profits for our shareholders, but we must also support our approach to being a reliable and responsible energy supplier."
In his remarks, Rigas referred to the issue of climate change and spoke of "huge investments" by the global oil and gas industry to support the development of renewable energies and reduce the carbon footprint of the oil and gas companies, which are responsible for supplying fossil fuels that release billions of tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year. "When I sat down and talked with my son and his friends, all in their 20s, I asked them what the most pressing problem in the world today was, and the almost unanimous answer was the climate crisis," he said.
He added that Energean announced in December 2021 that it would become a company that releases zero greenhouse gases in the future, a vision he said that "I don't know exactly how we will achieve it - but I'm sure we have to work towards it."
"Much more than money"
Regarding the Globes Energy 2023 Conference, in cooperation with Halliburton, Rigas says that he is looking forward to examining Israeli technologies and ideas that will help undertake a technological revolution in the field. "We want to identify and locate new ideas that will make our drilling more efficient, for example," he said. "We drill wells today with a 25% chance of success. In essence, we are saying to investors, 'Give us your money, and you have a 75% risk of losing it.' Anything that technology can do to improve these odds will be significant," he said.
Rigas said there is a perception that the industry as outdated, "but the reality is completely the opposite. Through cooperation with Energean and Halliburton, we will be able to test the technological developments in reality, in the real world."
He added,, "I look forward to hearing about ideas coming from Israeli industry, evaluating them, investing in them. We are interested in developing an entire ecosystem in which Israeli technology will change the global business of oil and gas."
"The opportunity we offer is much more than money," Rigas continued. "We are going to meet dozens of companies here, find breakthrough technologies and allow them access to the market. We will focus on what will help us improve operational efficiency and advance us on our way towards zero net carbon emissions."
Full disclosure: Globes Energy 2023 Conference was held in cooperation with Energean and Halliburton
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on May 31, 2023.
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd., 2023.