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INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENTS DURING 1996
"brief, general summary of international activity"

The following (from AAPG Explorer, August 1996) "is a brief, general summary of international activity. Sources include company reports to the EXPLORER, Petroconsultants, Oil and Gas Journal, and personal interviews and contacts with the EXPLORER staff and correspondents."

AFRICA

North Africa
Egypt
Testing continues at an apparent gas discovery by IEOC and Amoco on the Baltim block offshore Nile Delta. The site is nine kilometers north of a shut-in gas discovery earlier this year. A nine-block inventory that includes offshore and onshore blocks, including the Western Desert, is being offered with a Sept. 30 deadline.

West Africa
Angola
Angola is on a winning streak with a string of offshore discoveries reported this year that are spurring further exploration. Total reported a wildcat in the Lower Congo Basin that yielded a cumulative 9,150 barrels a day from the Middle Cretaceous Pinda Formation, with Elf reporting five oil bearing zones on Block 17 in the Basin. Just one of the five zones yielded 2,800 barrels a day. Meanwhile, explorers also are looking onshore in the Kwanza Basin as Fina relinquishes its license. A rebid is planned.

Cameroon
Nine blocks, four of which are offshore, are being offered, that include virtually all unlicensed areas of the Douala Basin between the coast and the Equitorial

Guinea.
Congo
Elf Congo and 30 percent-partner Chevron have begun producing from 14 wells from the N'Kossa offshore field in water depths of 500 to 1,000 feet and production from about 10,000 feet. About 100,000 barrels a day are expected by year's end. Elf Congo also has been awarded an exploration permit on a 3,830-square-kilometer tract offshore adjacent to the Haute Mer tract where the N'Kossa field is located. Haute Mer also includes last year's Moho discovery, which is still being evaluated.

Cote d'Ivorie
Five offshore blocks on the San Pedro Margin are available, including one 2,350- square-kilometer tract that has had only a single dry hole drilled on it with the benefit of late 1980s 2-D seismic.

Equitorial Guinea
Six straight offshore oil discoveries by operator Mobil has put this country on the "producing country" map. Five wells are planned by CMS Nomeco on a block adjacent to the discoveries of the Opalo and Zafiro fields.

Southern Africa
South Africa
Phillips is evaluating existing data on 1,500 square kilometers in two blocks on the east coast with an eye for seeking exploration rights. The company has exclusive rights to the data through November.

EUROPE

Bulgaria
A third round of licensing is due to open in early 1997, with 10 onshore blocks to be offered.

Croatia
State company INA/Naftaplin said its 2,600-meter deep wildcat 70 kilometers east of Zagreb and southwest of the Sandrovac field is an oil and gas discovery, although no well results were revealed. No bids were received on a 9,300- square-kilometer offshore block by the June 1 deadline. Agip and Texaco previously drilled dry holes in the area. Next door to the no-bid area, the Yugoslavian Republic of Montenegro is looking for joint venture partners. The republic has no production, with the few wells drilled being sited along the coastline.

France
Essorep and Elf have tested an apparent discovery on the Lege permit in the Parentis sub-basin, with a wildcat testing 1,685 barrels of oil a day from the Purbekian sand. An 8,050-square-kilometer block offshore the Pyrenees Orientales of southern France has been granted to Elf on a five-year term. Esso is accepting invited bids this month on 12 Aquitaine and Paris basin licenses and oil fields put on the block in the spring. The move has been categorized as a rationalization of holdings. The offering includes 100 percent interest in the Cabeil-Lucats, Lugos, Mothes and Parentis fields in the Aquitaine Basin, and the Campotran, Donnemarie, La Bremonderie, Malnoue and Vulaines fields in the Paris Basin.

Greece
Bids were received on all but two blocks in a licensing round that offered six areas onshore and offshore the Ionian Sea west coast. The offshore areas included some declining production areas close to Turkish interests.

Italy
A new field wildcat in the Adriatic Zone A license of the Po Basin was reported by Agip to test 15 million cubic of gas a day from the Porto Garibaldi formation. It is five kilometers west of a discovery last year that tested over seven million cubic feet of gas a day.

Malta
A licensing round is expected to be announced later this year.

Netherlands
BHP continued to shed non-core assets by selling its interests in one producing tract and four exploration blocks in the Dutch North Sea to Dyas BV, a Dutch company. BHP divested North American producing properties earlier this year.

Norway
Upper Jurassic sandstones yielded 4,403 barrels of oil a day with gas in drillstem tests on an apparent discovery on the H structure in Block 35/11 west of Sonefjord.

Romania
Fifteen onshore blocks are on offer under improved terms with the first national licensing round to close Nov. 1. Romania now produces about 129,000 barrels of oil a day from shallow pools. Observers expect new exploration will concentrate on the deeper Paleogene, Mesozoic and upper Paleozoic sections, especially in the Transylvanian Basin and in the Constanta area, adjacent to discoveries in the offshore Black Sea.

Spain
A subsea pipeline is allowing initial oil production from the new Rodaballo Field in the Ebro Delta Basin. Repsol discovered the field last summer and plans to boost production to 5,000 barrels a day. Repsol plans to drill five wildcats in the Gulf of Cadiz beginning in October, in water depths of 1,000 to 1,200 meters.

United Kingdom
The "fast tracking" of licensing continues by the UK, with Energy Minister Tim Eggar pushing a proposal that would include a competitive bidding rather than the current, more time-consuming compulsory work program system that includes fees. Eggar said the proposal would not affect the current licensing round and or frontier areas. The concept of the proposal, which would put a deadline on development activity, is to be able to respond more rapidly to technology and markets. Some operators are taking a dim view of the idea, fearing that competitive bids might lead to demands for large up-front payments. Talisman is acquiring Britoil's interest in the North Sea's undeveloped Ross Field, where the 60-100 million-barrel field development approval is expected this fall.

EURASIA

Azerbaijan
Exxon has been granted exclusive rights to negotiate exploration deals for two offshore blocks in the Azerbaijan Caspian Sea about 100 kilometers south of Baku. 

Sakhalin
With a production-sharing agreement with the Russian and Sakhalin sovereigns approved, the $15 billion Sakhalin I development project has begun. The project includes a $200-$300 million resource appraisal of three fields that will include 3-D seismic surveys, drilling, coring and testing existing wells in the area, in about 50 meters of water about 30 kilometers northeast of Sakhalin Island. Exxon, along with fellow 30 percent partner Sodeco, estimates 2.5 billion barrels of.oil and 15 TCF can be produced. Meanwhile, the Sakhalin V tender offer for five exploration tracts has been approved, but with no time table yet announced. Three of the five tracts were part of two previous tender offers that received no bids. 

Turkmenistan
Production sharing terms will be included. Turkmenistan plans a two-block tender offer covering 70,000 square kilometers in the Caspian Shelf. Western Atlas is shooting 7,000 kilometers of seismic over the tender areas. Also, nine onshore blocks are planned. An early 1997 opening is expected.

Ukraine
The Ukraine has six projects seeking attention, including the Odessa and Shmidt fields on the Black Sea shelf and four onshore areas. Officials at the International Pavilion at the AAPG annual meeting said the industry has an open invitation to enter negotiations.

MIDDLE EAST

Iran
Five upstream projects and six downstream projects are being negotiated with foreign companies under terms which services will be funded by export sales of the product produced by the project after the fact. Average cost recovery is estimated at two to four years.

Israel
An apparent onshore oil discovery has been reported by the Israel National Oil Co., with 170 barrels a day reported in the Dead Sea Graben. Offshore, Agip has taken a 35 percent farm-in on Avner Oil's offshore Mediterranean permit. About 7,000 kilometers of seismic are being reprocessed and a new survey over the 4,000-square-kilometer tract in the Pleshet Basin is due.

Qatar
With the discovery flowing at the rate of 10,000 barrels of oil a day, Arco has initiated production from the Al Rayyan offshore field. Output is projected to increase by 30,000 barrels of oil a day with the completion of three additional wells this summer.

PACIFIC RIM & CHINA

Australia
Oryx has won the rights to explore an area off the Ashmore and Cartier Islands. The rights extends for a maximum 11-year term and 21-year production period in the event of a commercial discovery.

China
A Bohai Bay discovery by operator Kerr-McGee tested 5,970 barrels of light, sweet oil a day from an upper Cambro-Ordovician zone and 980 barrels a day from the lower zone. The well, in about 40 feet of water, was drilled to 11,755 feet and is nearby a heavily industrialized and populated coastline. KM, which holds 45 percent, has partners that include Murphy Oil Corp. (45 percent) and Sino-American Energy Corp., Houston (10 percent) in the exploration phases.

A 21,000-square-kilometer area in the Qaidam Basin in the Qinghai province will be evaluated by Amoco.
Texaco has signed an exploration agreement on a 540-square-kilometer tract in the Sichuan Basin about 1,000 miles southwest of Beijing. The 5,500-million-square acre basin provides about 45 percent of all of China's gas production.

Chevron acquired rights to explore a 783-square-kilometer tract in the South China Sea near two other exploration areas that the company acquired last year. The latest addition to Chevron's acreage was made about a year after receiving a two-year agreement to evaluate the area.

A lot of re-thinking is being done about the East China Sea - 10 straight dry holes by various companies tends to make that happen.

Indonesia
Pertamina has announced two frontier blocks in the Timor Sea in the proximity of recent discoveries in the Indo-Australian Zone of Cooperation land the Northern Australia Zone. Geco-Prakla, which provided the spec surveys for Indonesia, said prospect mapping of the pre-Tertiary horizons has demonstrated seismic structural closures similar in size and style to the recent discoveries of the Zone of Cooperation. Meanwhile, observers note the tough terms of the agreements, though the geology has a lot to offer.

New Zealand
Two previously unoffered tracts in the Taranaki Basin off North Island are offered with a Sept. 6 deadline. All other unlicensed acreage, both on and offshore, are available for licensing by direct negotiations.

Philippines
Complex geology continues to baffle explorationists, as Oxy and Shell report dry holes. As Petroconsultant's Jay Gallagher noted, "success continues to elude" explorers here. But, hey, look at what happened at Canada's Leduc Field (see story, page 34). Meanwhile, licenses were granted to Australian company Sterling to explore off the Babuyan Channel and to Cophil in the Central Luzon Basin and between the Lingayen Gulf and the Manila Bay Channel.

Vietnam
Tough contract terms that won't be renegotiated and poor showings have resulted in retreats from the country by a couple of major players. BHP has written off its $151 million (Australian) investment in the Dai Hung Field in the Con Son Basin Block 5/1 West. Partners Total, Carigali and Sumitomo agreed that the fiscal terms of the contract do not warrant further appraisal. Total is looking for partners in two blocks in the South Con Son Basin, with Shell and Norsk Hydro leaving the consortium in Block 11-1, and Shell (operator with 60 percent) and Shell-affiliate Sodeco (20 percent) leaving in Block 10. Shell had previously withdrawn from Block 11-2, leaving Pedco as operator with Mobil as a partner. Meanwhile Fina tested 3,000 barrels of oil a day with gas from two Miocene intervals at a wildcat in Malay Basin Block 46. Shell remains a partner on this one through its affiliate Sodec with 25 percent.

SOUTH AMERICA

Brazil
Brazil always has been attractive to explorationists. It's now becoming gorgeous. A phased-in opening to foreign investment is hoping to attract partners to explore the country's 29 major sedimentary basins, of which only eight are under production or development. "Dozens" of major E&P projects are already being negotiated, anticipating congressional implementation this fall of the privatization approved last November, according to Petrobras President Joel Medes Renno. Renno said future licensing rounds will focus initially on the Solimoes Basin in the Amazon, the Reconcavo/Tucano in Bahia and others in the Acre, Parnaiba and Parecis basins. Also, Rio has been selected as the site of the 1998 AAPG international meeting, with the Geological Society of Brazil as host. 

Ecuador
Partners are being sought through a competitive tender offer to develop three heavy oil fields in the Tiputini area of eastern Oriente.

Falklands
Four bids were received on a 44,000- square-kilometer offshore block. Bid partners include British Gas and YPF of Argentina and Shell and Agip. A four-company group includes Lasmo, United Texas, Norsk Svalband and Desire, a new company led by the former president of Clyde Petroleum of London. Desire is also a partner with Amerada Hess on another bid. The Desire company was named after the ship that historically first sited the Falklands in the 1500s.

Trinidad & Tobago
Nine deep-water tracts east of Tobago is available, with bids due Nov. 1.

CENTRAL AMERICA

Dominican Republic
With oil and gas seeps continuing to tease explorationists, two rigs are working in two basins of this country, according to AAPG member Gerald Ellis, director general of mines. Two recent wells in the Cibao Basin, drilled by Petrolera Once Once, had hydrocarbon shows, but were non-commercial. Mobil Dominica and Murfin Oil, of Kansas, is working a tract on the Azua Bani basin onshore and offshore.

NORTH AMERICA

Mexico
As the only country in the Americas still closed to foreign exploration, Pemex and oil companies continue to position for eventualities. Pemex officials have said the state-owned company plans to concentrate on its "core activities" and "non-core activities" will be outsourced, including seismic acquisition and processing. Meanwhile, companies continue to open offices in Mexico City. (See page 29, Explorer, August 1996).