Autralian oil driller Santos seeks partners for two oil exploration blocks in India
07 Mar 2009
Santos, Australia's third largest oil and gas exploration company, having licences in two offshore deepwater blocks in the Northern Bay of Bengal, is seeking partners to take stake and share the cost for oil and gas exploration.
Santos had committed to spend $70 million (A$90 million) over a period of eight years in oil and gas exploration in India after the Indian government awarded it two offshore deepwater exploration licences in the Bay of Bengal in 2007 (See: 52 Oil, gas blocks approved under NELP-VI)
Santos subsidiary, Santos International Operations Pty Ltd, has a 100-per cent working interest and operatorship of blocks NEC-DWN-2004/1 and NEC-DWN-2004/2, covering approximately 16,500 square kilometres in the NortheastCoast Basin, in the Northern Bay of Bengal, where in the past gas discoveries were made.
Reliance Industries had made significant gas discoveries on seven different occasions in the same area while state-run ONGC struck big with huge gas discoveries in November 2008. Myanmar had also made gas discoveries in the same region led by a consortium of oil companies, including ONGC, GAIL and Korea's Daewoo.
The blocks are approximately 250 kilometres south southeast of Kolkata and 175 kilometres from the Indian coast and the work program is for Block NEC-DWN-2004/2 includes 2D and 3D seismic surveys and one exploration well.
The work programme for NEC-DWN-2004/1 consists of 2D and 3D seismic surveys with the exploration period for both blocks being eight years.
But due to the current economic slowdown and declining oil and gas prices globally, the Adelaide-based company had cut back on exploration costs including the prestigious Reindeer project, which is a joint venture where it has a 45-per cent interest.
Although the company has not included the Indian business in its cost cutting measures, it is still looking for partners to take a stake and share the cost of exploration at its Indian operation before it commences drilling.