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/ 83.31.43.* / 2011-04-27 12:46
Kulczyk Oil Ventures Inc. (KOV), an exploration company controlled by Polish billionaire Jan Kulczyk, will start drilling Syria’s Block 9 next month, the Oil Ministry said.
Kulczyk Oil also wants to revise its bid for Block 3 in the north of the country, it said, citing Chief Executive Officer Timothy Elliott who met with Syrian Oil Minister Sufian Alao in Damascus today.
“The company is interested in continuing its operations in Syria and is ready to improve the bidding conditions it offered for Block 3,” the Oil Ministry said in a statement.
Syria, struggling to halt a decline in crude oil output, is seeking foreign investment to help stabilize production this year at a rate of 386,000 barrels a day, Alao said Jan. 26. Output peaked at 596,000 barrels a day in 1995, and the country will deplete its existing reserves within 18 years, according to its reserves-to-production ratio as calculated by BP Plc.
Kulczyk Oil, along with Total SA (FP), Eni SpA (ENI), China National Petroleum Corp. and nine other foreign companies, submitted bids for exploration rights in eight onshore blocks covering 40 percent of the country’s territory, Deputy Oil Minister Hassan Zainab said Dec. 15.
Some of the offers were very similar and the Oil Ministry has asked interested companies to improve their bids, Alao said March 13. Should offers still be “unsatisfactory,” the blocks will be offered in a new bidding round, he said at the time.
The Calgary-based company won the right to explore the block in 2007, though drilling has yet to start. It has a 45 percent net operating interest in the 10,032-square-kilometer (3,870-square-mile) site in northwest Syria. MENA Hydrocarbons Inc. has 30 percent, Triton Petroleum Pty Ltd. 20 percent and an “unrelated” party 5 percent, according to Kulczyk’s website.