DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — U.S.-based Occidental Petroleum on Sunday acquired the 24.5-percent stake in Dolphin Energy Ltd., an Emirates-based company, previously held by Enron Corp., the official news agency WAM reported.

        The $310 million deal was signed by Ray R. Irani, Occidental Petroleum chairman and CEO, and Emirates Foreign Minister Sheik Hamdan bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Dolphin's CEO, WAM reported.

        State-owned U.A.E. Offsets Group, which maintains a 51-percent stake in Dolphin, selected Los Angeles-based Occidental over four other bidders — BP, Conoco, ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch/Shell. It will take over for Enron, which abandoned its interest in Dolphin after collapsing last year in the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history.

        TotalFinaElf, which holds a 24.5-percent stake in the project, will largely be responsible for gas development. Occidental, the second partner, will focus on constructing the Gulf's first cross-border pipeline.

        The project entails the transfer of gas from Qatar's North Field to a gas gathering and processing plant at Ras Laffan in Qatar, and through an undersea pipeline to Taweelah in Abu Dhabi and Jebel Ali in Dubai.

        First gas deliveries to the United Arab Emirates are expected in the last quarter of 2005.

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