Iraqi Kurds’ Independence Vote Exposed Risks to Energy Strategy
Iraqi Kurdish leaders have long sought to craft an energy policy independent of the federal government in Baghdad, courting international companies
and offering lucrative deals to drill for potentially huge new reserves of oil and gas.
The energy consultants Wood Mackenzie peg total potential oil
and gas holdings in the region at about 13 billion barrels, and Kurdish officials have worked to attract investment from international oil companies.
The Kurds and the federal government have also never agreed on how to share oil revenue, or how
to handle oil concessions in Kurdistan — or even what territory constitutes the Kurdish region.
Energy giants like Chevron and Exxon Mobil shrugged off the threats of legal action by the Iraqi government
and the displeasure of Washington by signing contracts with the Kurdish region at a time when oil prices were significantly higher than they are now.
Genel Energy — the London-listed company co-founded
and led until 2015 by the former BP chief executive Tony Hayward — has in the past two years sharply downgraded its estimates of the volumes in the Taq Taq field, one of its two Kurdish mainstays.
