Abu Dhabi’s Adnoc Keeps $150Bn Spending in Growth Push

Abu Dhabi National Oil Co (Adnoc) will maintain spending at $150bn over the next five years as it targets growth in production capacity at home and expands internationally.

The company’s board approved the capital expenditure plan that’s in line with the previous layout that was announced three years ago. Since then, Abu Dhabi’s biggest oil producer has carved out an international investment business called XRG that is scouring the globe for deals.

XRG has boosted its enterprise value to $151bn from $80bn since it was set up about a year ago, Adnoc said in a statement. The unit, which this year got stakes in Adnoc’s listed companies with a total market value exceeding $100bn, aims to become among the world’s top five suppliers of natural gas and petrochemicals, along with the energy needed to meet demand from the AI and tech booms.

XRG has also snapped up contracts for liquefied natural gas in the US and Africa, bought into gas fields around the Mediterranean and is in the final stages of a nearly $14bn takeover of German chemical maker Covestro AG.

Still, the company’s biggest effort yet fell apart in September when the firm dropped its planned $19bn takeover of Australian natural gas producer Santos Ltd It bounced back with a deal announced this month to explore buying into an LNG project in Argentina.

Adnoc’s board, chaired by UAE President and Abu Dhabi ruler Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, reviewed plans to expand oil and gas production capacity. It formed an operating company for the Hail and Ghasha offshore natural gas concession and boosted the project’s production target to 1.8bn cubic feet per day, from 1.5bn, by the end of the decade.

Adnoc is in the process of increasing oil production capacity to 5mn barrels a day from 4.85mn a day currently. The UAE’s Opec+’s quota allows it to produce just over 3.4mn barrels a day in December, and raising capacity further would leave more of the capability lying idle.