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Brief history of the country
Lebanon (the Lebanese Republic) is bordered by Syria to the north and east and Israel to the south. The Mediterranean Sea lies on its west.
Lebanon was the ancient homeland of Phoenicians, part of the Persian empire from 539 BC and then of the Roman Empire from 54 BC. In the 7th century Muslims took control although the Maronite Christians, founded around 400 AD, remained autonomous. When the Druze emerged from Shia Islam, they and the Maronites held the mountains while coastal cities were run by Caliphs.
From 1516 the Ottomans ruled until the empire collapsed in World War 1. France then established Greater Lebanon in 1920 and the Lebanese Republic in 1926. In 1943 the country gained independence with a government split on religious lines.
Lebanon supported Arab countries in the 1948 war against Israel and an influx of Palestinian refugees fuelled sectarian tensions that eventually led to the 1975 Lebanese Civil War. The country had become prosperous through tourism and commerce but this 15-year war between Christian groups (supported by Syria), and the PLO, along with Druze and Muslim militias, left it in ruins.
In 1989 a ceasefire was negotiated and in 2005 Syria withdrew but the country remains tense whilst the Syrian civil war (since 2012) worsened Lebanon’s economic situation. In August 2020 a huge explosion of ammonium nitrate stored at the port drew the world’s attention to the country’s failing administration and corrupt politics.
Tensions with Israel after the Hamas attack in 2023 led to unrest and sporadic bombing on both sides of the border.
Oil and gas summary
Lebanon lies on the northwest edge of the Arabian tectonic plate and the eastern edge of the Levant basin. It contains 4 north-south trending physiographic regions.
A narrow coastal plain widens to the Akkar plain in the south. East of this the Lebanon mountains form a steep ridge of limestones and sandstones that run for most of the country's length. The Beqaa valley, which is part of the Red Sea rift valley system, lies between these mountains and the Anti-Lebanon range of mountains in the east.
Lebanon has no identified indigenous oil or gas resources, either onshore or offshore. However, the country may have potential for gas and even oil discoveries in deep waters near the border with Israel and Cyprus in the Levant Basin.
Offshore blocks have been released in Licensing Rounds and the first well was drilled in 2020, a dry hole, but progress has been slow. Political risks are high. No resources are currently ascribed to Lebanon by Globalshift.
LEBANON
Map and National Flag
E. MEDITERRANEAN
Market stall
East Mediterranean
Capital
Population
Land area (sq kms)
Oil prod (000s b/d)
Gas prod (bcm/yr)
Oil cons (000s b/d)
Gas cons (bcm/yr)
Beirut
4.3 mm
10,452
None
None
120
None
Government
Lebanon is a parliamentary democracy which implements a system known as confessionalism to deter sectarian conflict, representing the demographic distribution of 18 recognized religious groups.
The President has to be a Maronite, the Prime Minister, a Sunni, the Speaker, a Shi’a, and the Deputy Prime Minister and Speaker, Eastern Orthodox.
The legislature is unicameral with 128 seats divided equally between Christians and Muslims.
The government department responsible for oil and gas resources is the Lebanese Petroleum Administration (LPA) reporting to the Ministry of Energy and Water.
LEBANON: OFFSHORE BLOCKS
Globalshift.co.uk (source: USGS)
Geology and History of Exploration
Lebanon is on the northeastern edge of the Arabian Plate. Its western half, west of the Beqaa Valley, lies within the East Mediterranean Basin. This formed during the break-up of the Pangea super-continent in the mid-Permian to Middle Jurassic and led to a thick sequence of clastics and carbonates deposited in grabens.
During the Middle Jurassic to Late Cretaceous, the basin was a passive continental margin with normal faulting and subsidence. A carbonate shelf was deposited, alternating with clastics on the basin margin. In the Late Cretaceous to Paleogene the region experienced compression due to the convergence of the African and Arabian plates which led to inversion of the grabens, strike-slip faulting and uplift of the Lebanon mountains.
Along the Lebanon offshore margin and in the Beqaa Valley there are north-south trending faults that run semi-parallel to the Dead Sea Transform which accommodate the movement between the Levant basin area and the Arabian plate.
At the end of the Miocene, the Mediterranean Sea became isolated from the Atlantic Ocean, which led to deposition of thick evaporites. This was followed by inundation from the ocean and Pliocene to Recent sedimentation. The Levant basin covers the easternmost region of the Mediterranean Sea between Cyprus and the Nile Delta cone in Egypt. The basin contains up to 10,000 kms of Mesozoic and Cenozoic sediments above the rifted Triassic to Lower Jurassic sequence.
A number of large gas discoveries have been made in the deep waters of the Levant since 2009 in Israel, Cyprus and Egypt. The older sequences of the basin are structurally complex with compression and extension periods due to plate motion and salt tectonics. However, the fields have reservoirs mostly within young flat-lying turbidite fan sequences dipping into the deep waters.
No discoveries have yet been made offshore Lebanon but Globalshift believes it also has the potential for gas accumulations.
History - Just 6 exploration wells have been drilled in Lebanon, five onshore between 1947 and 1966 and one offshore in 2020. All were dry holes. Although small oil and gas accumulations may be preserved in the coastal plain of south Lebanon no production is forecast due to intractable security issues.