AMMAN (Dow Jones)-U.S. oil field service company Weatherford
Internatonal Ltd. (WFT) has won a deal worth $224.4 million to
drill 20 wells in the Buzurgan oil field in southern Iraq, a Iraq
cabinet spokesman said Tuesday.
Ali al-Dabbagh said in a statement following a cabinet meeting
headed by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that the cabinet had
approved the deal.
"The company would drill these wells within two years," he
said.
Buzurgan oil field is in Missan province, which has proven oil
reserves of more than 2 billion barrels. It is currently producing
100,000 barrels a day.
The new wells would boost output to a total of 130,000 barrels a
day, according to an Iraqi oil official.
Drilling new wells in the field is part of a "crush plan"
initiated by the Iraqi oil ministry earlier this year. The plan
aims to boost the country's crude oil production by 500,000 barrels
a day within two years.
Iraq, which sits on the world's third largest oil reserves,
produces only around 2.3 million barrels a day.
-By Hassan Hafidh; Dow Jones Newswires; + 962 799 831 831;
hassan.hafidh@dowjones.com