India again extends bid deadline for oil, gas blocks

India has again extended a deadline to 21 September for submitting bids for 28 upstream oil and gas blocks to be developed.

The deadline for the ninth bidding round under the Hydrocarbon Exploration and Licensing Policy's Open Acreage Licensing Programme has been repeatedly extended, with the latest extension because of the amendment of an existing law to enhance the ease of doing business in the exploration and production sector. The law will involve incorporating consequential investor-friendly changes in the model revenue-sharing contract for the current and subsequent rounds, the government said.

The law amendments propose to grant the petroleum lease on stable terms where its terms will not be altered to the disadvantage of the lessee during the period of the lease, while allowing sharing of production facilities and infrastructure.

The ninth bidding round was announced on 3 January with bids due by 29 February. It was then extended to 15 May and then to 31 August.

India has offered 136,596.45km² in 28 upstream oil and gas blocks in the ninth bidding round, with the previous extension to provide more granular data about the blocks to help upstream companies make a decision.

India also extended the deadline for bids for a special upstream bidding round to 13 September from 16 August. It had invited bids for two discovered small oil and gas fields located in the Mumbai offshore region and one coal-bed methane gas field in West Bengal, with the deadline initially set for 15 July.

India will offer a total of 25 oil and gas blocks in the tenth bidding round after the conclusion of the ninth round. The offer will cover 13 sedimentary basins, including six onshore blocks with an estimated area of 16,871km², six shallow water blocks covering 41,391km², one deepwater block of 9,991km² and 12 ultra deepwater blocks of 12,3733km².

India's upstream licensing has largely been dominated by domestic firms. State-controlled upstream firm ONGC in January secured seven of the 10 areas in exploration blocks offered under India's eighth open acreage licensing policy drilling round. A private-sector consortium of domestic conglomerate Reliance Industries and BP, state-controlled upstream firm Oil India and private-sector Sun Petrochemicals received one block each.

India's hydrocarbon exploration has been lacking because of slow policy implementation, limited discoveries, shrinking exploration capital and a complicated tax regime.

India produced 427,000 b/d of crude during April-July, 1pc lower from a year earlier, according to government data. India imported about 88.3pc of its crude requirements during April-July, up from 87.8pc a year earlier. The country has been trying to increase its domestic crude production and reduce its dependence on imports.

By Roshni Devi