The Israeli government is racing against time to strengthen the influence of the gas and energy sector and grant permits to international and local companies with the aim of expanding drilling and exploration operations in gas fields located in the economic waters off the coasts that it controls, amid expanding its ambitions for gas and oil in the eastern Mediterranean and seizing control of the “Gaza Marine” gas field off Gaza.

The government's frantic and hidden race to expand Israel's influence in the gas and energy sector comes after the "Al-Aqsa Flood" battle on October 7, 2023, froze projects and plans to expand Israeli gas fields that were targeted during the war on the Gaza and Lebanon fronts, according to a report by Al Jazeera.

Amid the suspension of plans to expand exploration and drilling in the gas fields, namely the Leviathan field, the Tamar field, and the Karish field, and even the irregularity of extracting and pumping gas from the fields and platforms due to their targeting during the war on Gaza, the government committee for the gas sector, headed by the Director General of the Israeli Ministry of Energy, Yossi Dayan, intensified its deliberations regarding the policy of the Israeli gas sector.

During the deliberations of the Joint Ministerial Committee, it was revealed that the gas reserves in the fields off the Israeli economic waters will be depleted within two decades, and on this basis, it recommended in the document that it will submit to the government to give the green light to the companies supervising the “Leviathan” field to develop it and expand exploration within it.

Leviathan field first

The development of the Leviathan field is supervised by: the Israeli company NewMed Energy, which is active in the field of oil and gas exploration and owns about 45% of the field, and the Chevron Corporation, which is an American multinational energy company operating in more than 180 countries around the world and owns about 40% of the rights to the Leviathan field.

Also, the Israeli company "Ratio Yahash" owns 15% of the "Leviathan" field, and has additional rights offshore and onshore, including permits to explore for gas and oil inside Israel.

The partners in the Leviathan field recently submitted an updated plan to the Israeli Ministry of Energy aimed at increasing gas production from the field by an additional two billion cubic meters per year, raising it from a development plan of 21 billion cubic meters to 23 billion cubic meters per year.

This represents another 10% addition to the original plan of the field partners (NewMed Energy, Ratio and Chevron), with the investment cost expected to be around $2.4 billion.

In order to make the final investment decision in the Leviathan field, the company hopes to obtain the necessary permits from the Israeli government to expand exports and sign contracts for more than 100 billion cubic meters additional, as the partnership is expected to soon complete another expansion project that will increase the quantity to 14 billion cubic meters by 2026, bringing the annual production capacity to 37 billion cubic meters.

Israel has three gas fields, the largest of which is the Leviathan field, located in the eastern Mediterranean, about 130 kilometers off the port of Haifa, and operated by Chevron and jointly owned by New Med Energy and Ratio Yahesh. The field began operating at the end of 2019, and produces 12 billion cubic meters of gas annually. The field currently exports about 90% of its gas to Egypt and Jordan, and 10% is sold to Israel.

The second largest field is the Tamar field, which was discovered in 2009 and is operated by Chevron, which is jointly owned by Isramco, Tamar Petroleum and Mubadala Petroleum. The field is located in the eastern Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Ashdod and Ashkelon.

The third is the Karish gas field, which was developed in 2019. It is a natural gas reservoir located in the eastern Mediterranean Sea near the Leviathan and Tamar fields. The proven gas reserves in the field are estimated at 1.3 trillion cubic feet.

Gaza Marine

Last month, as the Gaza ceasefire went into effect, Idan Benjamin, energy correspondent for The Marker, reports that the joint ministerial committee for Israeli gas policy “held its final session on expanding Israel’s gas and energy sector, expanding drilling in existing fields and granting permits to local and international companies to explore for gas, with the aim of determining Israel’s energy future.”

He explained that the government committee, during the multi-front war, intensified discussions on the gas economy policy in the Eastern Mediterranean, in order to determine the future of energy in Israel, as well as to allow continued gas exports to Jordan and Egypt. The reason for this is that about 70% of electricity in Israel is produced using gas, a rate that is expected to increase in the coming years due to the cessation of the use of coal.

Benjamin pointed out that the draft report of the Gas Sector Policy Study Committee showed that Israel's gas reserves are expected to run out within two decades, which means that Israel's position "as an energy state in the Middle East is fragile and unstable and does not give it any superiority over the energy exporting countries in the region. On this basis, the green light comes to global and local companies to expand and develop gas fields, the first of which is the Leviathan field."

It is likely that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seeking to convince the administration of US President Donald Trump to develop "Gaza Marine", which is located within Palestinian territorial waters off Gaza City, as well as the "Marine 2" field, which is located within the maritime border area between the Gaza Strip and Israel.

In light of these developments, transformations and estimates regarding Israel’s gas reserves, Israel’s consumption of natural gas in 2023 rose to 24.7 billion cubic meters, divided into 13.1 billion cubic meters for the local economy and 11.6 for exports, indicating that Israel must be ready to import gas after more than two decades if it does not discover additional fields or expand the discovered fields to meet the increase in needs and consumption.

The year 2024 will witness a 3.5% increase in domestic consumption and about 21% in exports, as the war on Gaza and Lebanon disrupted the third pipeline project to expand the gas sector infrastructure in Israel, according to the economic newspaper Globes.

In 2024, 11.1 billion cubic meters were produced from Leviathan, compared to 9.1 billion cubic meters from Tamar and 4.6 billion cubic meters from Karish. Leviathan was the source of 78% of Israel’s gas exports, with the rest coming from Tamar, since all of the gas from Karish is directed to the local economy.

However, due to the war, the American company Chevron decided to suspend work on laying the marine pipeline at the Leviathan gas field site, as well as postpone the completion of the third pipeline project. The delay in the pipeline project is not expected to lead to a shortage of gas in the local Israeli market, but rather to a decrease in gas allocated for export to Egypt and Jordan.

Israel's gas exports

With the Israeli domestic gas market slowing dramatically and the ongoing need for revenue, and the global countdown to the phase-out of fossil fuels beginning, energy and environmental researcher Dr. Daniel Muder says, “Israel and its energy companies are making huge efforts and budgets to increase gas exports from Israel before gas becomes irrelevant.”

Madar presented a research study on Israel's aspiration, in cooperation with American companies, to expand the gas sector in Israel and acquire more gas fields and exploration sites in the eastern Mediterranean, noting that Israel is looking to double its gas exports to the world.

The energy and environment researcher pointed out in the research study that reviewed what was included in the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper that Israel, in order to increase its gas exports, is expanding and developing the gas and energy infrastructure network along 100 kilometers on land, linking the gas platforms to the ports, and also linking them to the network lines that reach Egypt and Jordan.

He pointed out that the partners in the Leviathan field, which is the largest off the Israeli coast, are seeking to expand exports further, at a time when the Joint Ministerial Committee is postponing the publication of the document that includes its recommendations to the government regarding the gas sector policy, as the publication of the document was delayed due to the war, and it is estimated that the current amount of gas in the fields in Israeli economic waters will not last more than 20 years.

The committee estimates that the Israeli economy will need an additional 515 billion cubic meters by 2048, but the expected gas supply to the Israeli economy is only 440 billion cubic meters. Accordingly, the committee is pushing to encourage investments in the energy and gas sector in Israel, develop the fields, and increase gas production to the maximum.

The companies that own Israel’s gas fields estimate the reserves at 1,027 billion cubic meters, while the Israeli Energy Ministry estimates the reserves at only 850 billion cubic meters. That’s a gap of 177 billion cubic meters, equivalent to 13 years of Israeli domestic consumption, the draft report said.