Argentina Boosts Gas Exports to Chile
Argentina’s energy secretariat has granted authorisations to subsidiaries of US super-major ExxonMobil and Germany’s Wintershall to export conventional natural gas to two Chilean companies under resolutions published November 28 in Argentina’s official gazette.
Argentina’s treasury department announced the resolutions in a December 3 statement posted to its website.
Under the resolutions, ExxonMobil Exploration Argentina will export up to 400,000 m3/day, or 84.8mn m3/year, to Innergy Soluciones Energeticas. The gas will be sourced from the Bajo del Choique, La Invernada, Los Toldos I Sur and Pampa de las Yeguas areas in Argentina’s Neuquen Basin, which sits in the prolific Vaca Muerta shale play.
Wintershall Energia, meanwhile, will export up to 750,000 m³/day (159mn m³/year) of gas from the San Roque and Aguada Pichana Este areas, also in the Neuquen Basin to Colbun, a Chilean power generating utility.
The exports are interruptible and for a short-term period between October 1, 2018 and May 1, 2019.
Increasing energy integration between Argentina and Chile are priorities for respective presidents Mauricio Macri and Sebastian Pinera, who in April 2018 signed a protocol agreement related to the export, import, marketing and transportation of electricity and natural gas, eliminating barriers and restrictions that had existed for more than a decade.