Saudi Aramco is planning one of its most ambitious spending efforts in the petroleum industry to meet rising energy demands, its chief executive said in Canada. Khalid Al-Falih, president and chief executive officer of Aramco, told the World Energy Congress in Montreal that a pragmatic approach to energy was needed to address the expected increase in global energy demands. He said global progress and development meant that more people would need more energy. “Consequently, we will have to meet the world's increased energy needs and do so in the most responsible manner,” he said. Despite the move toward renewable resources like wind energy, Falih said the world would continue to rely on fossil fuels to power economic development. With this in mind, the chief executive said his company was planning to spend lavishly to develop the energy that the world needs for sustainable development. “Over the next five years, we are undertaking perhaps the most ambitious capital program in the petroleum industry, with an increasing proportion of those funds directed to the gas and downstream oil sectors,” he said. Having built up a spare crude production capacity of over 4 million b/d, Saudi Aramco's priorities will now be gas development - where an increasing focus on unconventional gas is needed - to meet spiraling domestic demand, while its oil position will be sustained through, over the long term, raising recovery levels to 70 percent at its main onshore oilfields. Al-Falih said oil and gas giant would concentrate on technical development to replace and grow its oil reserves and that its gas shortage would be met by an increased focus on developing the kingdom's vast unconventional gas potential. Saudi Aramco expects to continue growing its oil reserves mainly through improvements to its recovery levels, hoping to raise those to 70 percent and add 40 percent to crude reserves “over time”, while its domestic gas shortage is to be met over the long term by the company moving into the exploitation of unconventional gas reserves in the Kingdom. Saudi Aramco is also hoping to escape its gas shortage dilemma by targeting unconventional gas reserves, which it believes could more than double its current gas reserves of “about 280 tcf”. Moving the company into an unconventional-focused gas exploration and production sphere will, however, require not only large investments, but also the attainment of a new technological skillset. The focus on unconventional gas will be aided by an $130-billion investment program. Al-Falih said Aramco's exploration efforts have indicated that the Kingdom could hold “hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of unconventional resources such as shale gas, more than doubling its proved reserves of 280 tcf.” New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in October, shed 78 cents to $76.02 a barrel from Tuesday. Brent North Sea crude for October lost 25 cents to $78.91.
