After its fall and its flight to Russia, Bashar al-Assad’s regime left behind a destroyed and collapsed state in terms of infrastructure, and it needs many years to rebuild at all levels, which places the new government and the governments that will follow it facing great challenges to building the state.
One of the issues with a strategic dimension that requires the new administration to find quick solutions is ensuring a stable level of energy security, because any defect in it leads to political, social and economic instability and delays the development process in the country.
The reality of Syrian oil
Syria’s proven oil reserves are estimated in the latest statistics for the year 2015 at about 2.5 billion barrels, according to what was published by the specialized American energy magazine. In the period leading up to 2011, oil production averaged 350,000 barrels per day.
Syria was exporting 150,000 barrels per day of crude oil, and the rest was directed to the Homs and Baniyas refineries, which have a refining capacity of 240,000 barrels per day.
The average consumption reached 350 thousand barrels per day, and Syria imported an average of 105 thousand barrels per day of condensates (diesel, gasoline, kerosene).
Syria has 3 export and import ports on the Mediterranean Sea: Tartous, Latakia, and Baniyas.
What about gas?
The amount of proven gas reserves in Syria recorded 8.5 billion cubic meters according to 2015 statistics, and the average daily production volume of gas not associated with oil reached 250 million cubic meters, which constitutes 58% of Syria’s gas production, while the production of gas associated with oil reached 28%. %, as the majority of it comes from the region east of the Euphrates.
Obstacles to oil exploitation in Syria
Over the past decades, the Assad regime applied unsophisticated techniques in oil production, which were based on the process of water injection into oil wells, where huge quantities of groundwater are pumped into the wells to facilitate oil extraction.
This method has harmful consequences on the compositional nature of the earth, and damages oil wells.
- The first obstacle
The greatest damage to Syrian oil wells and surrounding areas remains the spread of nuclear radiation, according to experts.
According to the US government’s Environmental Agency, nuclear radiation is formed on surfaces near oil and gas fields during the production process, and the radiation is associated with backwater flow from wells. These radiations are harmful to the environment, humans, animals, and the agricultural lands surrounding oil wells, and must be cleaned and dealt with on an ongoing basis.
Based on this, Dr. Anas Al-Hajji, an oil industry expert, confirms in his article published on the Energy Platform on December 11, 2024, that the areas surrounding oil wells in Syria are full of nuclear radiation, as a result of the exit of international oil companies from Syria in 2012. Those companies were the only ones capable of With its expertise and modern tools to clean up nuclear radiation.
Dealing with the radiation clean-up process was beyond the scope of the previous Syrian government’s ability. According to Dr. Al-Hajji, the government assigned the multinational company “Shell” to carry out the clean-up process in areas near Syrian oil wells, but the company did not continue the clean-up process due to its departure from the country in 2012.
Currently, observers believe that nuclear radiation will spread more than before due to the use of primitive methods by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – and before them by the Islamic State – in extracting oil. Thus, we are facing a natural, economic and social catastrophe surrounding oil wells.
This means that the Damascus government, even if it takes control of all the oil wells in the country, is expected to be unable to benefit from these wells for production and consumption for a long period that may reach years, until the wells and their surrounding areas are cleaned again.
- The second obstacle
The second obstacle facing investment in oil wells is that throughout the period of the conflict in Syria, although the rigs and oil fields were not subjected to military strikes, they were subjected to sabotage and require extensive maintenance, and stopping the fields’ production for a period of time has consequences on the production process, as it becomes It is difficult to return to the previous productive state.
On the other hand, the oil refining stations in Syria appear to be in a dilapidated and old condition and need maintenance and cannot be relied upon in the refining process. It is known that Syria owns two refineries, the first in Homs and the second in Baniyas, and the total capacity of the two refineries in the past was about 240 thousand barrels per day. It used to meet three-quarters of the country’s demand for refined petroleum products locally before 2011, but their production capacity has diminished significantly.
Pipelines linking oil fields, refining stations, and consumption areas were also subjected to sabotage, especially oil pipelines extending from the oil fields of the cities of Hasakah and Deir ez-Zor to the refineries in Homs and Baniyas.
- The third obstacle
The international sanctions imposed on Syria are also one of the obstacles preventing the entry of international companies to rehabilitate oil wells.
Therefore, Syria faces a major problem at the environmental level, as the issue of nuclear radiation waste must be resolved by entrusting a foreign company with the cleanup process.
The infrastructure for the production and consumption of energy resources in Syria also needs to be restructured and modernized.
At the present time, Syria remains facing an energy crisis, due to the inability to secure energy resources for local consumption, which portends consequences on the social and economic level, and complicates the process of stability and development in Syria, especially if the country witnesses a large return of citizens, which will exacerbate the crisis, due to the lack of the ability to Water and electricity production and transportation provision.
Solution proposals
The new government faces a great deal, and it is important to find a solution to the problem of securing the energy resources needed to produce electricity and transportation, and to pump water.
By virtue of the reality we have discussed, it is difficult for the state to meet the country’s growing needs, which may exceed 350,000 barrels daily, and if there is an influx of Syrians returning from countries of asylum, the need may rise to more than 400,000 barrels daily.
Based on this, we recommend the following solutions:
1- Working to contract with Arab companies to build solar energy systems or farms to produce electricity. These are projects that may succeed in Syria to a great extent, as they provide sunshine for quite a few times throughout the year.
With regard to financing projects, it is possible to contract with companies that undertake construction and sales operations and receive the project profits for an agreed upon period of time.
In this context, Saudi ACWA Power is considered one of the most prominent international companies in this field, and has implemented many projects, such as in Morocco and Egypt. Saudi Arabia has the largest solar panel production factories in the world.
With this process, the government achieves two goals: first, to secure the energy needed to produce electricity, and second, to achieve diversification in sources of energy production instead of relying heavily on thermal plants that consume gas and diesel, which reduces the pressure from importing oil.
2- Import diesel and gasoline ready for consumption, and avoid importing crude oil, due to the inability of oil refineries to refine it. It is possible to rely on shipments coming from Saudi Arabia and Algeria, receive them through the port of Latakia, and distribute them to the markets.
3- Assigning the gas industry in Syria to Qatar Energy Company, which is classified as one of the leading companies in the Middle East region in the gas industry. In fact, the company manages many investments in Mauritania, Lebanon, Cyprus and other countries.
Qatar Energy will contribute to developing the infrastructure for gas wells, which will increase production and achieve self-sufficiency for Syria, and end the crisis of 12 years of inability to provide domestic gas.
4- Working to develop the infrastructure for oil production and refining through contracts with advanced foreign companies, after ending sanctions on the country.
5- Making the country a vital corridor for energy lines. Here we can talk about expected projects. The first is an oil pipeline from Iraq to Syrian ports, and the second is a Saudi project that transports green hydrogen via a pipeline from Saudi Arabia through Syria and Turkey to the European market.
