When did it all start?
The estimates are new and have only emerged in the last decade. However, Lebanon’s interest in its potential hydrocarbon dates back nearly 50 years. In the late 1960s Lebanon started its first exploration for oil and gas, focusing however on onshore developments. In 1970, onshore wells were drilled across the country. The explorations were interrupted in 1975 by the Lebanese civil war. It’s not until 2000 that the Lebanese government could focus again on energy, rightly shifting its attention to offshore oil and gas and signing in 2002 a contract with Spectrum Geo to carry out two-dimensional seismic surveys of offshore resources. Lebanon was finally on the right track and it’s only in 2006 that the first 3-D survey is performed by Norwegian Petroleum Geo-Services. In 2007, Lebanon and Cyprus signed a maritime border agreement that is, to date, still not ratified. In 2010, the Lebanese parliament passes the Offshore Petroleum Resources Law (OPRL) and Lebanon submits simultaneously a unilateral maritime border demarcation of the Lebanese-Israeli borders to the UN. Unfortunately, maritime borders remain an issue to date and constitute the main obstacle that separates the Eastern Mediterranean energy-wealthy countries from the ultimate fruition. Despite the remaining handicaps, Lebanon has made good progress in its offshore explorations.