Sudan will open a fourth crude pipeline with a capacity of 150,000 barrels per day (bpd) by the end of the year, raising total output to more than half a million bpd, an oil ministry official said early on Wednesday.

"We have now three pipelines for crude oil and two for products and we will be having another one by the end of the year -- a crude pipeline," said Mohamed Siddig from the Sudanese oil ministry.

He added it would have a capacity of 150,000 bpd for the Nile Blend sweet produced in Sudan.

The pipeline was due to be opened by August this years but work was delayed.

Siddig did not give a reason for the delay.

Sudan produces up to 330,000 bpd of crude, the oil minister has said.

Sudan's oil has fueled a conflict in the south which claimed up to two million lives over the past two decades.

That conflict ended with a January peace deal and under its terms the former rebels and the government have formed an eight-member joint petroleum commission to monitor future oil contracts and production.

Under the deal the south will get roughly half of Sudan's oil revenues, although officials have said this money has not been paid in full as yet.