The final investment decision regarding the Neptun Deep project will be made in the middle of 2023 and we are closer than ever to the start of this project, said, on Thursday, in a press conference, the managing director of OMV Petrom, Cristina Verchere, according to Agerpres.

„Romania has been producing oil and gas from onshore lands for over 150 years, and the decline (of production, ed. n.) can no longer be compensated by onshore deposits. Therefore, the Black Sea is the answer for Romania’s energy security and new sources must be brought into the energy system. (…) We have proposed the largest investment plan in the energy sector in Romania, of approximately 11 billion euros by 2030. Neptun Deep is at the heart of this strategy. We became operators in August 2022 and took an intermediate step towards the final investment decision by filing the commercial discovery declaration at the end of last year. We are currently moving forward with the auction process. Subsequently, we will go through the internal governance process. As previously announced, we intend that the final investment decision will be made in mid-2023, with the first gas to be produced in 2027. We only have a few months left until the final investment decision and we are closer than ever to starting this project,” Verchere explained.

She pointed out that the declaration of commercial discovery has been confirmed by the National Agency for Mineral Resources and is now being worked on to make the final investment decision.

„It is a long-awaited and very interesting project for us, for the company, for Romgaz’s partner, for the entire country and, in this context of energy security, even more so. We became an operator, we have an international team that works and makes a lot of efforts. We are doing everything we can to make the final investment decision. We are working and we are very confident that we will move forward,” the OMV Petrom CEO went on.

Regarding Neptun Deep and gas supply, Cristina Verchere said that Romania is the priority, but given the „over-supply” that resulted from the analyses, exports will also take place.

„If we look at the analysis regarding Neptun Deep, Romania will have a position of oversupply and then there will be exports and then we want to make sure that the necessary infrastructure exists and we want Romania to become a regional player on the gas market. But our priority remains Romania on the supply side,” the OMV Petrom official said.

OMV Petrom owns 50 pct of the deep sea perimeter Neptun Deep and is the operator of the perimeter. In August 2022, Romgaz completed the takeover of ExxonMobil Romania, which owned the remaining 50 pct of the project.

Agerpres