Repsol begins seismic survey at Cendrawasih Bay II block

Repsol Exploration will begin a 2D seismic survey along a 2,700-km stretch at the company?s Cendrawasih Bay II block in Supiori-Biak Numfor regency, Yapen island, Papua in the middle of March .

The company has recently started conducting a program to socialize the company?s exploration activities to the local people as part of the preparations for the seismic survey program.

Supiori Regent, Fredrik Manufandu, said that the local people strongly supported the oil exploration to be conducted by Repsol and hoped that its future operation would bring economic benefit to both the local people and the government.

Zulfikar Imran, the company?s senior official, said that the socialization program would be conducted in villages and districts located near the operation of the company.

Meanwhile, a staff of upstream authority BPMIGAS, Otniel Lodewyk, said that most of the people in the regency were not yet familiar with oil exploration activities because such operations were still relatively new in the area.

With such a social condition, a socialization program would be quite important, because exploration activities would normally take six to 10 years, he added.

Editing by Roffie Kurniawan