Chevron Completes Third Gathering Pipeline for Israel's Leviathan

This article was first published on Rigzone here

The Chevron Corp-led Leviathan consortium has completed the construction of a third pipeline from the natural gas and condensate field offshore Israel to the field's production platform.

The project also delivered platform upgrades, raising Leviathan's gas production capacity to about 14 billion cubic meters (494.41 billion cubic feet) a year, Leviathan co-venturer NewMed Energy LP said in a brief bourse filing Monday.

NewMed, part of Israel's Delek Group, announced the pipeline project's completion a day after  confirming Leviathan's production has been paused. NewMed said Israel's Energy and Infrastructure Ministry had ordered the suspension, amid the fresh conflict with Iran.

The partners have declared force majeure due to the suspension. Leviathan supplies gas to the domestic market, Egypt and Jordan.

Construction of the third gathering pipeline, part of Leviathan's initial phase (Phase 1A), had been delayed by the earlier conflict that followed Hamas' assault on Israel October 2023. NewMed announced the suspension of construction October 7, 2024. The consortium had planned to complete the pipeline mid-2025.

Leviathan, proven 2010 off the coast of Haifa city, started production December 2019 under Phase 1A, according to NewMed.

In 2026 the Leviathan consortium made a $2.36-billion final investment decision (FID) to proceed with stage 1 of Phase 1B.

Expected to start operation in the second half of 2029, the first stage aims to increase capacity to around 21 billion cubic meters per annum, NewMed said in a stock filing January 16, 2026. It had already announced August 21, 2025 that the Energy and Infrastructures Ministry had approved Phase 1B.

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"According to the development plan, stage 1 of the expansion project includes the drilling and completion of three additional production wells, the addition of supplementary subsea systems and expansion of the processing systems on the platform, with the aim of increasing the installed capacity of the platform up to approx. 23 Bcm per year", NewMed said January 16. "However, stage 1 of the expansion project is expected to increase the total gas production capacity of the Leviathan project up to approx. 21 Bcm per year, inter alia given restrictions of the subsea pipeline".

The increase to about 23 Bcm would be achieved under stage 2. The second stage is subject to regulatory approvals and agreement on further investment for a fourth pipeline between the field and the platform and more subsea installations, according to NewMed. The consortium expects to make a FID on stage 2 "in the coming years", it said.