Sri Lanka to auction more oil exploration blocks
COLOMBO, March 15 (Reuters) – Sri Lanka said it plans to auction new oil exploration blocks in the western Mannar basin and the northern Cauvery basin by mid-year, after finishing talks with India’s state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (BSE: CORPBANK.BO – news) on exploration rights.
Cairn India has discovered natural gas in two wells in Sri Lanka’s offshore Mannar basin, demonstrating the presence of hydrocarbons, although their commercial viability has yet to be determined.
“There is a plan to launch a bid round in the coming few months. It will include the shallower part of the Mannar basin and Cauvery off the northern peninsula,” Saliya Wickramasuriya, head of the state-run Petroleum Resource Development Secretariat (PRDS), told Reuters on Thursday.
ONGC has applied for exploration rights and the auction will be called only after talks with the Indian company are finished, Wickramasuriya said without elaborating.
“It will be approximately half of the Mannar acreage and pretty much all of the Cauvery other than what we might discuss and nominate to Oil and Natural Gas Corporation. But that discussion has not even started,” he said.
The tenders are likely to be called “before the middle of the year,” he said.
Cairn India has said it will start another phase of exploration in Mannar basin soon.
Sri Lanka produces no oil and is dependent on imports, which cost it $4.6 billion in 2011. Since the end of a 25-year war with Tamil separatists three years ago, the government has tried to reinvigorate oil and gas exploration.
Sri Lanka’s government has said seismic data shows the potential for more than 1 billion barrels of oil under the sea in a 30,000 sq km area of the Mannar Basin, off the island’s northwestern coast.
American and Russian companies from the mid-1960s to 1984 explored the Cauvery Basin but only traces were found and no commercial oil was produced. It has producing wells on the Indian side.
Source: Reuters
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Someone is earning big kommis on this.
The worldwide oil industry has concluded that undersea oil explorations are no longer economically feasible. Mybe, the decision makers in SL have not read that conclusion yet.
Indian ONGC should not be given exclusive rights to explore oil and gas in SL. Let ONGC compete for rights when auctioned, with other foreign companies, so that SL gets the best deal. I fear corrupt ministers, who are not real patriots, would get a nice back-hander to give away the rights to ONGC, at a loss to SL. Even if oil and gas are discovered and obtained, SL will only get a paltry 5% of our own resources, as in Nigeria, poluting the environment also. Oil and gas discovery in SL will therfore not be a boon to SL but a curse. The only people who benefit are the ONGC and other companies and ofcourse the corrupt ministers, who are patriots in name only.
PLEASE HON PRESIDENT, COMPELL ONGC TO COMPETE WITH OTHER FOREIGN COMPANIES IN THE AUCTION OF THE BEST BLOCS AND NOT GIVE IT AWAY TO ONGC AT A LOSS TO SL. INDIA IS NOT OUR FRIEND. IT HAS BEEN OUR BITTER ENEMY FOR CENTURIES AND REMAINS OUR BITTER ENEMY. DO NOT DELUDE YOURSELF WITH THEIR EMPTY RHETORIC. PLEASE ALSO SUPERVISE THE AUCTION OF THESE BLOCS TO RUSSIAN AND CHINESE COMPANIES MOSTLY AND PREVENT CORRUPTION OF MINISTERS IN RECEIVING BACKHANDERS IN THE SALE. ALL PROFITS SHOULD DEVOLVE TO THE NATION THROUGH THE TREASURY.
‘DIASPORA’ has returned to ONLANKA after several weeks of absence, following my exposure that ‘pora dias’ is none other than ‘diaspora’ written as an anagram. Why don’t you reveal your true Tamil name and admit yopur are in England or wherever outside SL?
chandayak langada?
What if something about 1% to be given to self appointed presidental advisers also…?