Iran offers Pertamina another oil, gas field
Monday, August 21 2017 - 02:39 AM WIB
Petromindo|Khalsa
The Iranian authority has offered Indonesia?s state-owned oil and gas firm PT Pertamina a larger oil and gas field on top of two fields offered last year, according to a Pertamina senior official.
Pertamina Upstream Director Syamsu Alam said over the weekend that the company is still in talks with the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) over its plan to acquire operating interest in two oil and gas fields in Iran, namely Ab-Teymour and Mansouri, of which each is estimated to have reserve of more than 1.5 billion barrels.
?Discussions are still in progress to acquire the two fields, Mansouri and Ab Teymour. Iran is offering another much larger field,? Syamsu said, but declined to disclose the name of the field.
He added that the company has yet to decide on the new offer as it is still focused on trying to grab operating interest in Mansouri and Ab-Teymour fields. He also said that it remains uncertain whether a deal over the two fields could be made this year.
?We can?t ascertained whether it will be this year, because it depends on Iran. The petroleum contract has yet to be made,? he said.
The government has supported Pertamina?s plan to acquire operating interest in the two Iran oil assets to help secure future crude supply for Indonesia. ?Our proven reserves currently stand at 3.6 billion barrels, while two fields (in Iran) alone have 3 billion barrels (of reserves), so it?s really huge. That?s why we hope, if (Pertamina) manages to obtain (the assets) the oil will be imported here, to add value,? Deputy Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Arcandra Tahar said recently.
Pertamina has submitted its proposals for the development of the two Iran oil and gas fields in February to National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC). The proposal was a follow-up step to the memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed by the two companies on August 8, 2016. Based on the MoU, Pertamina was given a chance to file proposals for development of Ab-Teymour and Mansouri.
Pertamina, however, announced on August 16 it has decided to cancel planned acquisition of two oil and gas assets in Russia due to huge tax consequence at home.
Syamsu said that the huge tax burden has made the planned acquisition to be no longer economically feasible for the company.
As part of a 2016 deal between Pertamina and Russia?s Rosneft to jointly develop the Tuban oil refinery project in East Java, Pertamina was given opportunity to invest in two of Russia?s oil and gas assets, namely Northern Tip of Chayvo Field (Sakhalin Island) and Ruskoye Field. Rosneft offered Pertamina of 20-37.5 percent interest in the Northern Tip of Chayvo Field project.
Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak