Oman Gas Company (OGC) aims to move up in the energy value chain by becoming a significant downstream player and further strengthen its midstream operations with minimal reliance on government support and funding. OGC’s Acting CEO Abdulaziz bin Said Al Mujaibi talks more about it in a detailed conversation with Akshay Bhatnagar and Kavita Nair-Fondekar
Congratulations to you on the 15th anniversary of Oman Gas Company’s successful journey. You have been an integral member of most part of OGC’s impressive track record. As you look back, how does it feel?
It feels very satisfying! We have come a long way and there is a lot more that we could do as we continue to move forward in our journey.
To give you a perspective on my association with OGC, I was working in Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) as the pipelines and operations engineer when I left them in 2003 and joined Canadian Energy Services, a company that looked after the operations of OGC at that time. I was with them for a short time of around three months as a regional manager and then I was given the responsibility of operations manager. We continued as Canadian Energy Services till 2004. In January 2005, the contract expired and about 90 per cent of the staff who were with the Canadian Energy Services shifted to OGC. And I officially joined OGC on January 1, 2005.
I worked with OGC as operations manager for 2-3 years and then I was promoted as the General Manager – Operations, a position I held till 2014, when it was decided that I would move from operations to the supply chain.
We underwent a restructuring at that time. From three directorates, we moved to five directorates, each one headed by a general manager. I took up the GM-Supplies position.
So you can say that I am one of the oldest in the company. I have seen the company grow, seen it face multiple challenges; build up the systems, processes and procedures. We came up from having around 24 or less customers and around 1,000 kilometres of pipelines. At the moment, we have approximately 2,500 kilometres of pipelines and we are continuing to expand. In the next few years, we will be installing few hundreds of kilometres of pipelines of oil and gas.
I remember, we had a very low percentage of Omanisation before and now we have reached over 92 per cent. And that’s something we are very proud of. I think we have grown well while meeting all of the government’s expectations. That is what Oman Gas Company is all about.
We have a big contract of gas availability of 99.998 per cent for 10 years or more, and I don’t think things like these happen by chance. It took a lot of efforts and dedicated people working day and night to make that happen.
How critical is the role of OGC in Oman’s economy and in particular, the oil & gas sector?
I would say that OGC is the only company that is transporting gas with the exception of one single line that PDO operates from Harweel to Sur apart from their internal gas pipeline network. Around 50 per cent of the gas produced in Oman is transported by OGC. We have been a major contributor in helping to power the country as we supply gas to all the power stations which in turn transport power to a lot of areas with domestic and commercial requirements, factories and refineries.
We also supply gas to the industrial side, to the aluminum smelter, steel manufacturers, refineries, methanol and urea plants, among others. At the moment, we supply gas to around 36 customers in over 46 locations as some customers have multiple locations. So we are very much a part and parcel of the growth and economy of the country. We are part of the body structure and co-exist with all other arms and entities to support the country and its economy in its sustained growth.
What have been the key historical milestones for the company?
There are so many of them. Earlier, the gas grids were only in the northern part of the Sultanate. Between 2003 and 2004, we managed to put up a gas grid all the way to Salalah and another one to Sohar. We put 300 kilometres pipeline of 32’’ to Sohar and 24” pipeline with a length of 670 kilometres to Salalah.
We are very proud of this achievement. Another key milestone we have achieved is putting compressor stations. We have put three compressor stations in the country — in Al Buraimi, Fahud and Nimr.
