BP to invest $3.5 billion in Egypt's energy sector over next three years

A portion of the investment will go towards renewable energy projects, including green hydrogen

The UK energy company has invested more than $35 billion in Egypt in the past 60 years. EPA

BP will invest $3.5 billion in Egypt along with its partners over the next three years, as the UK energy company seeks to expand in the country.

The announcement came after Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi met with BP's chief executive Bernard Looney on Monday.

The investments will go towards exploration, production and local development, according to a joint statement from the Egyptian presidency and BP.

A portion of BP’s investment will go towards renewable energy projects, with green hydrogen production highlighted as the most important project.

BP’s investment portfolio in Egypt, which dates back 60 years, was described as “pivotal” to the country's energy sector in the presidency’s statement. The company has invested more than $35 billion in the country during that time, according to its website.

BP currently operates numerous energy projects in collaboration with Egyptian companies, both state-owned and private.

Together with its partners, BP currently produces around 60 per cent of Egypt’s gas through a joint ‎venture with the Pharaonic Petroleum Company and Petrobel in the East Nile ‎Delta as well as through its operated West Nile Delta (WND) gas development.

The WND project, its oldest in the country, includes five gasfields that produce 1 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas.

The development is worth $9 billion, as per BP’s Egypt country profile.

The company also operates several other gasfields in Egypt. In 2018, it acquired a 10 per cent interest in a concession that includes parts of the Zohr field.

BP is also a 33 per cent shareholder of United ‎Gas Derivatives Company, a natural gas liquids operation that extracts liquefied petroleum gas and propane in partnership with Eni/IEOC and Gasco, the Egyptian ‎midstream gas distribution company.

In the renewables sector, BP’s solar power joint venture Lightsource bp formed a joint venture with Hassan Allam to fund, ‎develop, and operate solar projects locally.

On Saturday, BP's chief executive said that the world must invest in the production of oil and gas to avoid price spikes while accelerating the energy transition to combat greenhouse gas emissions.

Mr Looney said his company would invest 40 per cent of its capital on energy transition projects by the middle of this decade and 50 per cent by the end of the decade.

“We will invest between $55 [billion] and $65 billion as BP this decade in energy transition growth engines,” he said at the B20 conference in New Delhi.