Eni SPA has completed a deal with Perenco divesting several of the Italian company’s oil permits in the Republic of the Congo.

The offloaded upstream assets are “non-core to the Company strategy in the Country”, energy major Eni said in a news release Tuesday. It did not identify the assets.

Based on Eni’s announcement of the agreement June 27, the divestments had a price of about $300 million.

State-controlled Eni retains other operations in the Central African country.

“Eni has been present in Congo for over 50 years”, it said Tuesday. “The Country is at the core of Eni’s strategy with regards to the security of supplies and the energy transition initiatives.

“To date, Eni is the only company committed to develop the Country’s vast gas resources, in particular through the Congo LNG project which will exploit the huge gas resources of Marine XII, fulfilling the country’s power generation needs while also fueling LNG exports, supplying new volumes of gas to international markets focusing on Europe”.

In the Marine XII block, Eni made its first discovery in 2008 with the Litchendjili gas field, followed by Minsala and Nene.

“Eni currently supplies gas to the Congo Electric Power Station, which provides 70 percent of the country’s electricity production, and is strongly committed to promoting energy transition in the country, including developing agri-feedstock production initiatives destined for biorefining and not in competition with the food supply chain”, it added.

Last month, Eni announced the first export from the Congo LNG. Congo-Brazzaville’s first natural gas liquefaction facility is expected to have an annual production capacity of 158.9 billion cubic feet (4.5 billion cubic meters).

The project comprises two floating LNG facilities at the Litchendjili and Nene fields, both producing. Eni plans to start up the second plant in 2025.

“With the first cargo, the Republic of the Congo enters the group of LNG exporting countries, opening up opportunities for economic growth while contributing to global energy balance”, Eni said in a press release February 27.

The LNG project follows a pact between Eni and Congo-Brazzaville to increase gas production and export, in which they also agreed to pursue projects supporting the nation’s transition to clean energy.

“The Republic of Congo and Eni have also agreed to define initiatives to promote decarbonization and sustainable energy transition in the country, in particular in the areas of renewable energy, the development of an agricultural supply chain to produce feedstock for biorefining without competing with the food chain, the conservation and sustainable management of forests, the adoption of clean cooking systems, the capture, use and storage of CO2 [carbon dioxide]”, Eni said April 21, 2022, announcing the gas agreement.

In 2021 Eni inked a pact with Congo-Brazzaville for the industrial-scale production of castor oil to supply Eni biorefineries. “The industrial development phase is expected to see cultivations on 150,000 hectares with 90,000 estimated beneficiaries by 2030”, it said October 4, 2021.

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