“We hope that the winners will commit to their exploration target in accordance with our mission to find new oil and gas reserves,” Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry secretary-general Ego Syahrial said at a press conference on Tuesday.

The newly signed deals cover the East Seram, East Ganal and Southeast Jambi blocks. The three blocks were offered through direct offer, as the bidders had conducted a joint study.

In a joint study, a bidder conducts preliminary research on an oil and gas block to determine its profitability. Joint-study blocks are thus easier to auction off than unstudied blocks.

The winning bidders are Eni East Ganal Limited for the East Seram block, Balam Energy Pte. Ltd. for East Ganal and a consortium of Repsol Exploracion South East Jambi B.V. and MOECO Southeast Jambi B.V. for the Southeast Jambi block.

The ministry’s upstream business development director, Ediar Usman, was upbeat that the winners would fulfill their exploration targets, because he said the companies had passed the bid assessment.

The government is still struggling to find operators for 19 remaining exploration blocks that have been on auction since January, with the deadline having been extended to July 3 from June 19 initially. (bbn) 

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