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Reuters
Riyadh
Saudi Aramco has emerged from attacks on its oil facilities ‘stronger than ever’, Chief Executive Amin Nasser told employees in a message, adding that full oil production would resume by the end of this month.
The September 14 attacks on the Abqaiq and Khurais plants, some of the kingdom’s biggest, caused raging fires and significant damage that halved the crude output of the world’s top oil exporter, by shutting down 5.7 million barrels per day of production.
“The fires that were intended to destroy Saudi Aramco had an unintended consequence: they galvanized 70,000 of us around a mission to rebound quickly and confidently, and Saudi Aramco has come out of this incident stronger than ever,” Nasser said in the internal message, on the occasion of the Saudi national day, to be celebrated on September 23.
“Every second counts in moments like these, and had we not acted quickly to contain the fires and undertake rapid restoration efforts, the impact on the oil market and the global economy would have been far more devastating.”
Six days after the assault, which hit at the heart of the Saudi energy industry and intensified a decades-long struggle with arch-rival Iran, the state oil giant Aramco invited reporters on Friday to observe the damage and the repair efforts.
Thousands of employees and contractors have been pulled from other projects to work around the clock to bring production back. Aramco is shipping equipment from the United States and Europe to rebuild the damaged facilities, Aramco officials told reporters.
Aramco already brought back part of the lost production and will return to pre-attacks level end of September, Nasser said.
“Not a single shipment to our international customers has been missed or cancelled as a result of the attacks, and we will continue to fulfil our mission of providing the energy the world needs,” he said in the message, seen by Reuters. Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said on Tuesday that Saudi Arabia had used its reserves to maintain oil supply flows to customers abroad and inside the kingdom.
Aramco is shipping equipment from the United States and Europe to rebuild the damaged facilities, Fahad Abdulkarim, Aramco’s general manager for the southern area oil operation, told reporters on a tour organized by the company to the two sites east of the capital Riyadh.
Reuters reporters were shown repair work under way at both locations, with cranes erected around burnt-out stabilization columns, which form part of oil-gas separation units.
At Abqaiq, a number of spheroids, used to separate oil from other elements contained in crude oil, were surrounded by scaffoldings and had two-yards wide punctures in the dome.
Khalid Buraik, Saudi Aramco vice-president for southern area oil operations, said 15 towers and facilities had been hit at Abqaiq.
Riyadh
Saudi Aramco has emerged from attacks on its oil facilities ‘stronger than ever’, Chief Executive Amin Nasser told employees in a message, adding that full oil production would resume by the end of this month.
The September 14 attacks on the Abqaiq and Khurais plants, some of the kingdom’s biggest, caused raging fires and significant damage that halved the crude output of the world’s top oil exporter, by shutting down 5.7 million barrels per day of production.
“The fires that were intended to destroy Saudi Aramco had an unintended consequence: they galvanized 70,000 of us around a mission to rebound quickly and confidently, and Saudi Aramco has come out of this incident stronger than ever,” Nasser said in the internal message, on the occasion of the Saudi national day, to be celebrated on September 23.
“Every second counts in moments like these, and had we not acted quickly to contain the fires and undertake rapid restoration efforts, the impact on the oil market and the global economy would have been far more devastating.”
Six days after the assault, which hit at the heart of the Saudi energy industry and intensified a decades-long struggle with arch-rival Iran, the state oil giant Aramco invited reporters on Friday to observe the damage and the repair efforts.
Thousands of employees and contractors have been pulled from other projects to work around the clock to bring production back. Aramco is shipping equipment from the United States and Europe to rebuild the damaged facilities, Aramco officials told reporters.
Aramco already brought back part of the lost production and will return to pre-attacks level end of September, Nasser said.
“Not a single shipment to our international customers has been missed or cancelled as a result of the attacks, and we will continue to fulfil our mission of providing the energy the world needs,” he said in the message, seen by Reuters. Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said on Tuesday that Saudi Arabia had used its reserves to maintain oil supply flows to customers abroad and inside the kingdom.
Aramco is shipping equipment from the United States and Europe to rebuild the damaged facilities, Fahad Abdulkarim, Aramco’s general manager for the southern area oil operation, told reporters on a tour organized by the company to the two sites east of the capital Riyadh.
Reuters reporters were shown repair work under way at both locations, with cranes erected around burnt-out stabilization columns, which form part of oil-gas separation units.
At Abqaiq, a number of spheroids, used to separate oil from other elements contained in crude oil, were surrounded by scaffoldings and had two-yards wide punctures in the dome.
Khalid Buraik, Saudi Aramco vice-president for southern area oil operations, said 15 towers and facilities had been hit at Abqaiq.
