Oil, gas contractors seek contract extension

The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources said that there a number of oil and gas contractors which have applied for extension of their production sharing contracts, most of which are set to expire in 2018, Kontan reported on Wednesday.

The paper quoted Director General of Oil and Gas at the ministry IGN Wiratmaja Puja as saying that one of the contractors is JOB Pertamina-PetroChina East Java, which operates the Tuban block, in East Java.

Pertamina Senior Vice President for Upstream Business Development Denie Tampubolon confirmed the statement. ?In line with the regulation, we apply (for the extension of the contract) two years before the production sharing contract expires,? he told the paper.

According to the paper, there are a number of blocks whose current contracts are set to expire soon including Ogan Komering block operated by JOB PTM-Talisman Ogan Komering, Attaka block operated by Indonesia Petroleum Exp Ltd, Sanga-Sanga block operated by Virginia Indonesia Co Ltd, Southeast Sumatra block operated by CNOOC SES ltd, Block B and Block NSO/NSO Ext operated by Pertamina, and Block Tengah operated by Total E& P Indonesie.

Wiratmaja said that when extending the contract of blocks where Pertamina has interest, the government wants to see the state owned oil and gas firm to have higher interest in the blocks. He pointed as an example the ONWJ block where Pertamina?s interest has been increased to 73.5 percent from 58.28 percent. (*)