UAE - Profile - Hussain Sultan.

One of the close aides to Shaikh Mohammed Bin Rashid, Hussain Sultan is the CEO of Emirates National Oil Co. (ENOC) which has become a major business group. Fully-owned by the Dubai government, ENOC has both upstream and downstream divisions. Among ENOC's upstream assets is its 69.4% stake in the Irish-founded company Dragon Oil which operates the Lam and Zhdanov offshore oilfields in Turkmenistan. ENOC's other assets include a 120,000 b/d condensate refinery at Jebel Ali, where a plant producing gas liquids is called Dugas LPG, and a 500,000 t/y MTBE plant (see DT 21).

Part of the ENOC group are Dubai Shipping, which operates a fleet of oil and chemicals tankers, and ENOC Supply & Trading. Both are expanding. ENOC is also having a number of terminals and bulk storage facilities in various parts of the world (see OMT No. 21). In an interview with Petroleum Argus published on May 27, 2002, Sultan said: "Every year we (ENOC) review the performance of each of our companies and take action to improve it... We are strictly a commercial company". He said that, in trading, ENOC started with South-East Asia "as a strong market for us. We are now moving into the (Indian) subcontinent, and the Middle East. I have no doubt that we will eventually be moving into Europe, the Caspian and Russia... We aspire to be a major global trader".

ENOC owns extensive storage in Dubai and, jointly with Van Ommeren, at the Fujairah bunker terminal (see OMT 21). Sultan told Argus: "We have strong plans to increase trading volumes through our tanks. We are developing the subcontinent, South-East Asia, East Africa and Red Sea areas. We have supplied the Indian Ocean islands and East Africa..."

ENOC now wants to begin venturing into oil and gas E&P ventures outside Dubai. Dubai's oil reserves have begun to deplete. In its existing oilfields production costs have risen considerably (see OMT No. 21).