Natural gas producer Dolphin Energy is on track for the full commercial launch of its project to import gas from Qatar to the UAE in the first week of June, its chief said.

Dolphin Energy’s chief executive officer Ahmed Ali Al Sayegh said volume through the pipeline would reach two billion cubic feet per day by the end of the year and that the firm was still in talks with Qatar to raise the volume to the pipeline’s designed capacity of 3.2 billion cubic feet per day.
“We are hoping to reach agreement with the Qataris for the extra quantity of gas. We have not yet reached an agreement. It will take a long time because these are huge infrastructure projects,” Ahmed said.
The pipeline is already carrying 400 million cubic feet of gas per day to Dubai.
The pipeline is the first cross-border gas line in the Gulf Arab region and will help meet soaring energy demand in the UAE, which has witnessed a construction boom fuelled by record oil revenues. It had been expected to begin commercial operations in mid-summer.
Ahmed declined to reveal the price it would charge for the gas but said it comprised of a “reasonable tariff” on top of the price Qatar was commanding for supplying the resource.
Abu Dhabi government-run Mubadala Development Co owns 51 per cent of Dolphin Energy while France’s Total and Occidental Petroleum each have a 24.5 per cent stake.