The Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) plans to spend over $500bn in order to realise its plans of boosting its crude oil production by 2040, Kuwait’s state oil and gas entity has said, while highlighting its growth objectives for the next two decades.

"KPC is expected to spend $114 billion in capex over the next five years and an additional $394 billion beyond that to 2040," chief executive Nizar al-Adsani has been quoted by media reports as saying at an oil industry conference.

Kuwait's current oil production capacity is around 3.15 million barrels a day (b/d), an output it intends to raise to 4.75 million b/d by 2040.

Adsani also told the conference that KPC intended to lift domestic crude refining capacity to 2 million b/d by 2035, while ensuring maximum offtake of domestic heavy oil production and taking into consideration the need to meet local energy demand.

KPC recently began a pre-feasibility study to lift refining capacity inside Kuwait by almost 300,000 b/d, he said without elaborating. Capacity was estimated at 936,000 bpd in 2015, according to the US Energy Information Administration.

The company intends to expand into downstream derivative and specialty petrochemical products at facilities inside and outside the country, Adsani added.

Meanwhile, non-associated natural gas production in Kuwait is to increase to 2.5 billion cubic feet a day (cf/d) in 2040, from 0.5 billion cf/d expected in April 2018 and 1 billion cf/d by 2023, Adsani said.

As part of efforts to reduce emissions of harmful gases, KPC's future power plants will be gas-fired, although it will use renewable energy when that makes commercial sense, he mentioned.