Iraqi Oil Ministry officials attend a meeting on the development of Kirkuk’s oil and gas fields in partnership with BP.
Body including BP takes over four Kirkuk oilfields, targeting 450,000 bpd
BAGHDAD — Iraq’s Oil Ministry on Thursday handed operational management of four major Kirkuk oilfields to a joint operating body with BP, which aims to produce 450,000 barrels of oil and use 500 million standard cubic feet of associated gas a day.
Oil Minister Basim Mohammed Khudair al-Abadi oversaw the handover by video link, transferring operations at the Kirkuk, Bai Hassan, Khabbaz and Jambur fields from the state-owned North Oil Company and North Gas Company. Reaching the targets would take sustained work and close coordination between BP and the state companies, he said, calling BP a strategic partner and pledging government support. The ministry gave no timetable.
The next phase will include training Iraqi staff and transferring expertise and technology to the national companies, as well as community projects and public facilities for residents near the fields, Abadi said. North Oil and North Gas will keep supporting the project under the ministry’s undersecretaries for extraction and gas.
The handover follows a development agreement signed with BP in March 2025 to rehabilitate the four fields and expand gas processing, which targeted peak output of 420,000 barrels and 400 million cubic feet of gas a day and a 400-megawatt power plant to cut flaring. The project was formally activated in October 2025 with initial output targeted at 328,000 barrels a day, but economist Nabil al-Marsoumi said in March 2026 that BP had pulled out of the fields because of the regional war, leaving North Oil Company in charge of production.
BP holds 43% of BP Energy Company of Kirkuk Limited, the vehicle for the project, with ConocoPhillips at 42% and Turkey’s state-owned TPAO at 15% after a deal signed in July during Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi’s visit to Turkey. The Oil Ministry has cited a shortage of Kirkuk light crude as one reason for suspending supplies to Jordan, while about 57,000 barrels a day of Kirkuk crude went out through Turkey’s Ceyhan port in August.