Italy is not 'the Cinderella of Europe's oil and gas wealth.
Italy occupies third place among the other hand, producers of oil in Western Europe after Britain and Norway, with 330,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boe). Our country has proven reserves of oil and gas amounted to 1.9 billion barrels of oil equivalent (boe), while those yet to be discovered are measured from a minimum of 1.2 billion and 4 billion boe. The report highlights a dell'Assomineraria, the association of companies in the field of exploration and production of hydrocarbons. To confirm the potential 'national association announces that the British Northern Petroleum has received a preliminary eight new oil exploration concessions in Italy.
These are six offshore concessions, four of them in the Strait of Sicily and Southern Italy in the Adriatic two and two on land, in the Po Valley: Longastrino near Bologna and Gattinara in the province of Novara.
The company now automatically boots' environmental impact studies for the final go-ahead operations.Despite these potential ', the domestic production of gas and' dropped in 2005 to 12 billion cubic meters per year compared to 20 billion cubic meters a decade ago, when methane covering 37.4% of national consumption against 'current 15%. Dell'Assomineraria estimates, at this rate, in 2010 the domestic production of gas will go down 'to 5 billion cubic meters a year, covering only 5% of consumption compared to a growth in demand that led to 84 million cubic meters of national demand.
The Assomineraria proposes to bring into production of reserves already 'identified and in areas outside the North Adriatic Sea, about 700 million barrels of oil equivalent. ''Our country still has a considerable potential for hydrocarbon production and this could easily increase, doubling in a few years, if you were a more 'courageous to facilitate the development of fields already' discovered and to encourage a ' exploration languished for many years''explains the Assciazione. For example, there are 34 billion cubic meters of gas have already 'discovered in the northern Adriatic, whose development and' locked up in 1995 to fears of environmental impact, in particular related to subsidence.