Staff Reporter :
State owned Bangladesh Petroleum Exploration and Production Company Ltd (Bapex) and Australian oil company Santos on Monday entered into a deal to explore gas in Magnama field in the Bay of Bengal in a joint venture.
The gas field, discovered a few years ago, is located within block 16 in the Bay of Bengal in Bangladesh maritime boundary. After signing the deal, both sides termed it a ‘binding offer agreement’.
Santos has acquired Magnama gas field from Cairn Energy, which had drilled an exploration well in Magnama in 2007-08, and subsequently carried out 213 line kilometres of 3D seismic survey in early 2010. After taking over the field, Santos now moved to conduct drilling under the deal with Bapex.
As per the production-sharing contract (PSC), Bapex will have 49 percent stakes in the joint venture in the field while Santos 51 percent. Both have targeted to drill the first well in January next.
Once Bapex starts work with Santos in Magnama field, it will be first experience for the state-owned company to work in the offshore field. Bapex had a good experience to conduct exploration and production work in the onshore field, not in the offshore one.
However, Bapex managing director Md Atiquzzaman said though they signed the binding offer agreement, they will have to sign another agreement to make the deal fully affective on completion of some necessary vetting from a number of ministries.
He informed that Petrobangla which is the parent organisation of Bapex has already approved the deal.
Santos’s country lead Mahmudul Karim hoped that the binding offer agreement would enable Bapex and his company to undertake preparation works for the planned drilling in January next year.
Hiring drilling rigs and other services require seven to eight months before drilling operations, he said.
State owned Bangladesh Petroleum Exploration and Production Company Ltd (Bapex) and Australian oil company Santos on Monday entered into a deal to explore gas in Magnama field in the Bay of Bengal in a joint venture.
The gas field, discovered a few years ago, is located within block 16 in the Bay of Bengal in Bangladesh maritime boundary. After signing the deal, both sides termed it a ‘binding offer agreement’.
Santos has acquired Magnama gas field from Cairn Energy, which had drilled an exploration well in Magnama in 2007-08, and subsequently carried out 213 line kilometres of 3D seismic survey in early 2010. After taking over the field, Santos now moved to conduct drilling under the deal with Bapex.
As per the production-sharing contract (PSC), Bapex will have 49 percent stakes in the joint venture in the field while Santos 51 percent. Both have targeted to drill the first well in January next.
Once Bapex starts work with Santos in Magnama field, it will be first experience for the state-owned company to work in the offshore field. Bapex had a good experience to conduct exploration and production work in the onshore field, not in the offshore one.
However, Bapex managing director Md Atiquzzaman said though they signed the binding offer agreement, they will have to sign another agreement to make the deal fully affective on completion of some necessary vetting from a number of ministries.
He informed that Petrobangla which is the parent organisation of Bapex has already approved the deal.
Santos’s country lead Mahmudul Karim hoped that the binding offer agreement would enable Bapex and his company to undertake preparation works for the planned drilling in January next year.
Hiring drilling rigs and other services require seven to eight months before drilling operations, he said.
