UAE's Dana Gas and Crescent Petroleum announce 1st gas in Kurdistan region of Iraq

Dana Gas PJSC, the Middle East's first regional private-sector natural gas company, and its partner Crescent Petroleum, the Middle East's oldest private oil and gas company, have today announced the start-up of natural gas production, processing and transportation by pipeline in their major joint project in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.

Dana Gas and Crescent Petroleum are 50:50 partners on the project, and are investing US $650 million under a Strategic Alliance and service contracts signed with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in April 2007, making it the largest private-sector investment in Iraq today and the largest private-sector oil '&' gas project in Iraq in several decades.

The gas will supply new power plants under construction near Erbil and Sulaimaniya, which will provide eventually 1,250 MW of urgently needed electricity for over 4 million Iraqi citizens. This will provide Iraq with savings of approximately $2.5 billion a year in liquid fuel import costs.