OREANDA-NEWS Qatar state oil company Qatar Petroleum intends to invest at least $20 billion in the United States, Al Jazeera TV channel reported on Sunday, citing Qatar's state Minister for energy Saad bin Sharid al-Kaabi.

According to Al Jazeera, al-Kaabi also said that Qatar Petroleum intends to announce to its foreign partners plans to build facilities for liquefying suburban gas by mid-2019.

Previously, the Agency Bloomberg with reference to al-Kaabi said that the government of Qatar believed that the American a bill to ban the activities of the cartel of oil producers and exporters can be a threat to his investment in US, if he is in the Organization of countries - exporters of oil (OPEC).

According to the Agency, al-Kaabi also said at a forum in Doha that he began to promote the idea of withdrawal from OPEC in June.

The bill to ban the activities of cartel oil producers and exporters, known as NOPEC (No Oil Producing and Exporting Cartels Act), in the United States has been discussed since 2007. As noted by Reuters, this document, if adopted, would allow to challenge the actions of OPEC and its member States in the us court-created conditions for filing claims for attempts to influence oil prices through the conclusion of so-called non-competitive agreements.

According to Reuters, the Qatar national oil company Qatar Petroleum, which plans to invest billions in infrastructure associated with commuter transportation liquefied natural gas (LNG) in the United States, was concerned about the risk of possible adoption of NOPEC, as it sought to strengthen its position as the world's largest exporter of LNG. Qatar Petroleum is the owner of the Golden Pass LNG terminal in Texas along with American Exxon Mobil Corp and ConocoPhillips. The Agency also pointed out that Qatar Petroleum was considering the possibility of acquiring us gas assets and in the near future should have decided on additional investments in the Golden Pass LNG project.

On December 3, al-Kaabi announced Qatar's plans to withdraw from OPEC on January 1, 2019. At the same time, he stressed that the decision was caused by the desire to focus on the gas sector. Qatar's share in total OPEC oil production is less than 2%. At the same time, Qatar is the world's largest exporter of LNG and intends to increase LNG production from 77 million tons to 110 million tons per year.

Sources Reuters reported that the Emirate's exit from the cartel was preparing for several months. "This [exit from OPEC] excludes Qatar from all debates in the us Congress about whether OPEC is a cartel," James Dorsey, a senior researcher at the Singapore Sinnatambi Rajaratnam School of international studies, quoted Reuters as saying. - In any case, so the us will have Qatar in a good account."