Having already lost its crown as Eni’s top producer to Egypt in 2019, Libya was last year overtaken by Norway and relegated to third place. Given that net oil and gas output fell by a staggering 42% in 2020, Libya’s fall down the rankings is unsurprising (see chart 1).
You would be forgiven for blaming such a steep fall on last year’s devastating oil blockades which knocked out almost all of Libya’s 1.2mn b/d output capacity for eight months (MEES, 25 September 2020). While that certainly had an effect, it was only around 9,000 b/d on average, and was far from the only reason. Lower entitlements, reduced capex spending and “maturing fields” are other reasons according to Eni. (CONTINUED - 1671 WORDS)
