KASSEL, Germany, March 12 (UPI) -- German energy company Wintershall said Tuesday that oil from Libya and natural gas from Russia helped break production records.
Wintershall said last year it produced 144 million barrels of oil equivalent. That's 27 percent higher than 2011 and a record for a company with a 100-year history, it said.
The company said its work in the Russian gas sector and the production of an estimated 85,000 barrels of crude oil per day from Libya helped with overall production growth.
Wintershall Board Chairman Rainer Seele said the company aims to repeat last year's success in 2013.
"We will continue to grow, organically and with targeted acquisitions," he said in a statement. "We will continue to expand Wintershall internationally as the leading German oil and gas producer."
Wintershall said its after-tax net income for 2012 rose 13 percent from the previous year to around $1.5 billion. Sales by subsidiary BASF was up 39 percent from 2011 figures to $21.7 billion. BASF aims to increase production to at least 160 million barrels of oil equivalent by 2015.
Seele said that, in the foreign market, his focus was on Libyan oil, natural gas in Qatar and work in Abu Dhabi. Those projects should "act as a catalyst for expanding in the core region the Middle East," he said.
