Pertamina gives Natuna bidders 3 weeks to submit final proposals

State oil and gas company Pertamina said it had submitted request to the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources to open Natuna D Alpha Block Data Room to enable oil, gas companies that are interested to acquire stake in the giant gas block to access data, Upstream Director Karen Agustiawan said on Friday.

Karen said thus far, the government has yet responded to the request.

Once the data room is opened, companies short-listed by Pertamina will have one week to study the data and another three weeks to submit final proposal, Karen said, adding that Pertamina will want to make a quick decision to decide on partners to jointly develop the block.

Earlier, Karen has said that Pertamina will pick partners that would offer most advantage to Pertamina, including those which offer assets swap.

Minister of State Enterprises Sofyan Djalil also stated that government would not interfere in Pertamina?s decision to pick partners in Natuna.

Pertamina has short-listed ExxonMobil, Corp., Total SA, Chevron Corp., StatOil, Royal Dutch/Shell, Eni SpA, Petronas and China National Petroleum Corp. as potential partners in Natuna.

Pertamina plans to farm-out 60percent of interest in the block.

The government has handed over the block to Pertamina after the contract owned by American oil and gas giant ExxonMobil Corp. to operate the block expired. The block is believed to hold 47 trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas. (godang)