Battle over Aphrodite field concession agreement threatens timeline on exports to Egypt: The Cypriot government is reportedly leaning towards rejecting a proposal from the consortium holding the license for the Aphrodite gas field amending the revenue-sharing agreement with the Cypriot state, Cyprus Mail reports. Under the proposal recently floated by the consortium of Noble, Shell and Delek, the overall long-term revenues to the state would decline by EUR 2.3 bn, Energy Minister Giorgos Lakkotrypis told the nation’s MPs, the newspaper says.

The government will continue talks with the consortium, however, as any rejection would risk delaying plans to export gas from the field to Egypt’s liquefaction plants — a key component to Egypt’s strategy to become the gas export hub for the East Mediterranean basin. “Such a course of action would delay development of Aphrodite by eight to 10 years, thereby excluding the possibility of exporting the gas to Egypt, which is fast becoming energy self-sufficient,” Lakkotrypis says.