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Tuesday October 27, 2009

Petronas awards two offshore contracts


PETALING JAYA: Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) awarded two production sharing contracts (PSCs) for Block SB309 and Block SB310 offshore Sabah with an estimated minimum financial commitment of US$75mil and US$117mil respectively yesterday.

In a statement, Petronas said the PSCs were awarded to a partnership between its exploration and production arm Petronas Carigali Sdn Bhd and Talisman Energy Inc’s wholly owned subsidiary, Talisman Malaysia Ltd.

Talisman Energy is a global, diversified, upstream oil and gas company headquartered in Canada.

Under the terms of the PSCs, Talisman Malaysia, with participating interest of 70% in each block, will operate both blocks.

Meanwhile, Petronas Carigali will own the remaining 30% interest each in the two blocks. Talisman has agreed to spend a minimum of US$2mil on secondment training initiatives for each block in addition to the seismic and drilling commitments which cover six years.

“This venture supports our strategic objective of looking for material, low cost, international exploration opportunities,” Talisman said.

Petronas said the two blocks, measuring 5,815 sq km and 7,271 sq km respectively, were located in water depths of up to 150m.

“The previous exploration efforts were confined to the shallower sections in the blocks while the deeper sections remain mostly under-explored,” it said.

For Block SB309, the partners are committed to acquire 1,300 sq km of new 3D seismic data and to drill three wells to a minimum aggregate depth of 8,500m.

For Block SB310, the partners will acquire 1,300 sq km of new 3D seismic data and drill five wells to a minimum aggregate depth of 14,500m.

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