Cabinet on Tuesday approved the development and production plan for the Kronos gas field, which is located in Block 6 of Cyprus’ Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), with President Nikos Christodoulides stressing the importance of the plan’s approval ahead of the day’s cabinet meeting.

“Let me remind you that the first discovery in the Republic of Cyprus’ Exclusive Economic Zone was in 2011, and 15 years later, we are taking, I believe, the most important decision regarding the state of natural gas exploitation,” he said.

He added that in addition to the development and production plan, cabinet would also approve “the agreements concerning the basic terms of sale of Cypriot natural gas”.

“This is a very important development for the utilisation of our country’s energy resources. The goal is to sell the first Cypriot natural gas to Europe through Egypt in 2028 and we are approving all the relevant agreements,” he said.

He went on to say that there will be “further announcements very soon in collaboration with Exxon”, with the American multinational jointly holding the rights to drill in Block 5 and Block 10 of Cyprus’ EEZ with QatarEnergy.

“We are in advanced consultations and very soon we will be in a position to announce specific next steps,” he said,

The approval of the development and production plan comes with a final investment decision from the consortium comprising French multinational corporation Total and Italian energy company Eni over Block 6 still pending, despite hope that it would have been reached already.

In the absence of this, Energy Minister Michael Damianos agreed in March to create a joint technical committee which he said will “undertake the negotiation of the terms of sale of natural gas”.

“In essence, a joint committee will be established regarding the sale of natural gas to Egypt or to Egyptian state-owned companies,” he said, before adding that the committee will “operate at a technical level and will examine both commercial and technical parameters”.

Given the proximity of the Kronos field and Block 6 to Egypt’s Zohr gas field, which Eni also operates, Eni will be able to use its own infrastructure to take the Cypriot natural gas to the Segas liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in the Egyptian port city of Damietta, and export the gas to Europe and, if required, elsewhere from there.

Seabed surveys to find a sinking point for the pipeline which will take natural gas from Cyprus’ EEZ to Egypt for liquefaction began in June last year, with the initial aim being for natural gas from the Aphrodite gas field, located in Block 12 of Cyprus’ EEZ, to be taken to Damietta.

That came after the governments of Cyprus and Egypt, as well as American multinational corporation Chevron, Israeli energy company NewMed Energy, and the BG Group, which is owned by Royal Dutch Shell, signed an agreement which, according to the Cypriot government, established “the framework for the effective commercialisation” of the gas in the Aphrodite field.