Algerian Sonatrach Becomes Majority Shareholder of Medgaz Pipeline

The national oil company Sonatrach has become the majority shareholder in Medgaz SA, after having completed on 30 May 2020 a transaction to acquire 19.10% of the shares held by the Spanish company CEPSA Holding in this company.

With this major international operation, Sonatrach increases its stake by 8.04% in Medgaz SA, according to a press release from the national company.

Sonatrach's stake thus goes from 42.96% to 51% in Medgaz SA, which manages and operates the offshore gas pipeline directly connecting Algeria, departing from the compression station located in Beni-Saf, in Spain at the arrival terminal located in Almeria.

Through this acquisition, Sonatrach becomes the majority shareholder of Medgaz SA alongside its long-standing partner Naturgy, which owns 49% and ‘thus strengthens its position as a major and reliable supplier of Algerian gas to import customers to Europe, in particular the Iberian Peninsula through the Medgaz gas pipeline’, underlines the same source.

With a diameter of 24 in. and a length of 210 km, the offshore pipeline has an annual transport capacity of 8.2 billion m3, which will be increased during the 1st quarter of 2021 to 10.2 billion m3 by the addition of a 4th turbo-compressor at the Beni-Saf compressor station in Algeria.