Two PSC holders get gold rating from SKK Migas

Upstream authority SKK Migas announced on Wednesday it has awarded two exploration PSC holders ? PHE Nunukan Company and PT Saka Indonesia Sesulu ? Gold ratings in appreciation of their excellent performance in meeting their exploration commitment.

Besides, the agency also awarded the Green ratings, the second-highest in the SKK Migas rating system, to four companies and the Blue ratings, the third-highest, to six companies.

?Exploration contractors who perform well deserve appreciation,? SKK Migas? Vice Chairman M.I. Zikrullah said after bestowing the awards to the 10 PSC holders.

The companies were selected from among 96 PSC holders who have been holding their contracts for three years.

SKK Migas places exploration PSC holders into six categories in its rating system in view of their performance: Gold, Green, Blue, Pink, Red and Black. Gold means the contractors have met their firm commitment in full and made economic hydrocarbon discovery; Green means the contractors have met their firm commitment in full and made technical hydrocarbon discovery; Blue means the contractors have met their firm commitment in full; Pink means the contractors have met most of their firm commitment; Red means the contractors have only met a bit of its firm commitment; Black means the contractors have carried out geological and geophysical studies and nothing else.

Zikrullah admitted there are a lot of obstacles faced by contractors in meeting their firm commitment. As such, contractors must have a huge financial capability, work hard and strong commitment. The obstacles range from problems inside of the PSC holders (30 percent), unfavorable regulations (19 percent), lack of operational equipment (18 percent), subsurface problems (18 percent), fiscal-related problems (15 percent).

SKK Migas is ready to help contractors in overcoming their problems, including by speeding up the approval of Plan of Development (PoD), Zikrullah said, while calling on all stakeholders to support all efforts to push exploration and production.

He said at present, there are 21 contractors positioned in the Pink category, 15 in the Red category, 13 in the Black category.

?We are not reluctant to take punitive measures on contractors who fail to meet their firm commitment,? he said, adding the punitive measures may be in the form of announcing their names on the media, issuing them with Performance Deficiency Note (PDN). The PDN scheme may be followed up with a recommendation for the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources to terminate the contracts.

As of May 22, 2015, there are 321 working areas under the supervision of SKK Migas. Of the total, 239 are still in exploration stage, 15 in exploitation stage.

No	PSC Holders	Working Areas	Categories
GOLD
1	PHE Nunukan Company	NUNUKAN	GOLD
2	PT Saka Indonesia Sesulu	SOUTH SESULU	GOLD
GREEN
3	Eni North Ganal Ltd.	NORTH GANAL	GREEN
4	PT Radiant Bukit Barisan E&P	SW BUKIT BARISAN	GREEN
BLUE
5	Murphy Wokam Oil Co. Ltd.	Wokam II	BLUE
6	Inpex Babar Selaru Ltd.	BABAR SELARU	BLUE
7	Statoil Indonesia Halmahera II AS	HALMAHERA II	BLUE
8	Eni Indonesia Offshore Timor Sea I Ltd.	OFFSHORE TIMOR SEA I	BLUE
9	PT MRI Lirik II	LIRIK II	BLUE
10	Caelus Energy South Bengara II Pte. Ltd.	SOUTH BENGARA II	BLUE

Editing by Johannes Simbolon