12 October 2012, Sweetcrude, LONDON – ITALY’s oil and gas giant, Eni SpA, says Royal Dutch Shell Plc would be a perfect partner for the development and exploitation of its massive natural gas find in Mozambidue.
But, the company maintained that it was yet to hold any formal talks to reduce its stake in the gas discovery.
“Shell is one of our major partners worldwide…we always talk with Shell,” Claudio Descalzi, Eni’s head of exploration and production told a press conference in London, Thursday, to outline Eni’s upstream activities.
“Shell could be a wonderful partner,” he added.
The Eni executive also said the company would be “comfortable” talking with Exxon Mobil Corporation on the sale of part of its 70% stake in an offshore Mozambique block.
Shell is the world’s biggest shipper of liquefied natural gas and has extensive experience in developing the giant cooling systems needed to manufacture the fuel.
The Anglo-Dutch giant attempted to buy into a neighbouring Mozambique license area earlier this year, but its attempted takeover of the license holder, Cove Energy, was unsuccessful.
However, Mr. Descalzi stressed it hadn’t yet had formal talks on Mozambique with any other majors–neither Shell nor Exxon–stressing that Eni still had to resolve several key issues before such an engagement could go ahead.
