NICOSIA – Cyprus and a consortium led by Houston-based Noble Energy came to terms on a deal to ship natural gas from a field off the island to Egypt, Cypriot state TV reported, saying there was a reworking on how revenues would be divided.

Noble Energy leads the operation for sending gas to Egypt after building an undersea pipe, in association with British Gas and Israeli Delek Drilling, each of the three companies holding about one-third of the share, the Chinese news agency Xinhua said.

Noble Energy asked the Cypriot government last year to renegotiate the revenue sharing agreement for the 4.5 trillion cubic feet Aphrodite gas finding which is in Block 12 of Cyprus’ Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) discovered in 2011.

Noble Energy, saying it had incurred higher development costs, wanted the government to accept a smaller share of proceeds than the original 40 percent that had been agreed, to 30 percent but there were no reports what the compromise was.

Government sources told the agency that after the request was made seven months ago that Cyprus would be willing to renegotiate the deal, provided the companies agreed on a fixed time frame in relation to the commencement of the field’s exploitation. Development of the gas reservoir would run for roughly 15 years.