France's Total and Occidental Petroleum of the US each hold a 24.5% share in Dolphin Energy, which owns the project, with the remaining 51% stake held by the Abu Dhabi-owned Mubadala Development Co. "The export pipeline [constructed by Saipem using pipe supplied by Mitsui of Japan] was completed in August. Production platforms in Qatar have also been completed," Dolphin Energy's CEO Ahmad al-Sayegh said in November, "and we expect first gas to start flowing in the summer of 2007. The project is on schedule and proceeding very well. Receiving facilities in the UAE, the giant gas processing plant in Ras Laffan, and the production wells are in the final stage of completion," he continued. The flow of gas will reach its targeted quantity by the end of 2007. Gas will first go to contracted customers in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and the five other Emirates that make up the UAE and, in 2008, to Oman, which will receive 200m cuft/d. Mr Sayegh said Dolphin Energy was unaware of protests by neighbouring oil giant Saudi Arabia that the pipeline would pass through its territorial waters. "We have not received any objection from Saudi Arabia. The project is progressing well," he said. However, the government of Saudi Arabia is reported to have written to one of the lenders objecting to the venture on the grounds that the subsea pipeline will pass through its Gulf waters. A source familiar with the project, however, said the Saudi objection "could be understood in the context of the Saudi-UAE 'silent' dispute over the giant Shayba oilfield in the Empty Quarter", the desert region which straddles the border between the two countries. "The two nations are currently engaged in talks at a high political level to sort out their differences regarding the two issues," the source said. Dolphin Energy said in July that the pipeline will pass only through the UAE's and Qatar's maritime zones, adding that it received the necessary approval of authorities in both countries. The pipeline has a capacity to transport 3.2bn cuft/d of gas, but additional gas requires a new agreement between the two countries. "There is potential for many new customers, but there is not enough gas. Any further expansion requires a new agreement with the Qatari authorities," Mr Sayegh said. The Dolphin gas project also involves the transportation of raw natural gas from Qatar's North Field, the world's largest gasfield, through an 80-km pipeline to Ras Laffan for processing. In January, 2004, the first supplies of natural gas from Oman were received by pipeline at a control station in the UAE, marking the first-ever cross-border gas transmission between Gulf Arab states. The Omani supplies will later be replaced by Qatari gas, and the need for gas in the UAE is forecast to grow rapidly to about 6bn cuft/d by 2020, most of which will be used for power generation and water desalination plants. The UAE, which is an OPEC member, holds the world's fifth-largest gas reserves, but a sizeable proportion of it is sour gas with a high concentration of sulphur.