50 years of oil exports by Oman

Energy Wednesday 26/July/2017 22:00 PM
By: Times News Service
50 years of oil exports by Oman

Muscat: Oman celebrates 50 years of oil exports to other countries as July 27 marks Petroleum Development Oman (PDO)'s first crude oil shipment from the Sultanate.
In1967, the first crude oil exports from Oman were loaded onto 83,000 ton Norwegian tanker Mosprince at Saih Al Maleh (now known as Mina Al Fahal) to be transported to Japan. The invoice document dated August 8th 1967, shows that the cargo consisted of 543,800 barrels of net clean oil of API gravity 33.2.
At a price of US$1.42 a barrel, the shipment was worth almost US$750,000, quoted at pound sterling equivalent of 275,784. The amount equals US$5.5 million or OMR 2.1 million today.
PDO has since grown into one of the most sophisticated oil and gas companies in the world utilising hi-tech enhanced oil recovery techniques to tap aid in increasing Oman's daily output to more than a million barrels a day. Oil production from PDO sites amount to nearly 70 per cent of Sultanate's total production while it is currently responsible for producing nearly all the natural gas in Oman.
It currently produces at average more than 600,000 barrels of oil every day from approximately 10,000 wells in 178 oilfields across Oman. As of 2016, PDO capital expenditure reached $5.6 billion while operating expenses rationalised to $1.8 billion.
"PDO has a long and very proud history and has played a central role in the development of the Sultanate over many decades under His Majesty Sultan Qaboos Bin Said's wise leadership. PDO Day provided an excellent opportunity to reflect on the origins of the company and to recognise the contribution of everyone who has helped to make the company what it is today," PDO's Managing Director Raoul Restucci said on celebrating PDO day recently.
PDO was formed through an agreement signed between His Majesty Sultan Said bin Taimur and Iraq Petroleum Company (IPC) on June 24, 1937. In 1980, PDO was restructured into an LLC via a Royal Decree, and the company took its current name. In 1991, it began producing gas. And in 2002, it started implementing its Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) strategy.