State-run Bapex is looking for international partner or partners to develop half a dozen dried, suspended and abandoned onshore gas wells in Sylhet and Chattogram regions under joint venture (JV) to ramp up overall gas output.
The Bangladesh Petroleum Exploration and Production Company Ltd, or Bapex, has already floated an international tender, seeking expression of interest from the potential global firms to tie up as a JV partner.
Kasba-1 and Sundalpur-1 wells have already been located for drilling and development by the JV partner. Other wells are located at Patiya, Sitakund, Atgram and Muladi structures.
The JV partner firm will have to bear all the costs to bring the wells into production after proper evaluation.
The operation may require seismic data acquisition, processing, interpretation or any other interpretation or analysis and well data or well log data analysis followed by conventional and. or unconventional methods like horizontal drilling and fracturing recompletion.
Bapex will have no financial involvement at any stage.
Ramping up output from local gas fields and reining in the growing reliance on imported fuels, especially LNG, or liquefied natural gas, is the key target.
Bapex may ink revenue-sharing deal with the JV partner firm after developing the dried, suspended or abandoned but 'commercially viable' wells.
The proportion of revenue will be dependent on the overall hydrocarbon output from the area concerned.
Officials said developed countries like Canada and Brazil are utilising such mechanisms to boost local hydrocarbon production.
Even neighbouring India has moved to adopt such new mechanisms to utilize their dried, suspended or abandoned but 'commercially viable' wells, they added.
Bapex earlier had joint venture only with Canadian oil and gas exploration company Niko Resources with only 20 per cent stake to develop Kamta, Chhatak and Feni gas fields.
But a couple of blowouts at Tengratila gas field in Chhatak by operator Niko in 2005 and subsequent legal issues both in local and international courts turned the JV into a mess.
In recent years, officials said, Bapex and some other subsidiary exploration companies of Petrobangla have drilled dozens of onshore gas wells on a contractual basis.
Russian Gazprom, Chinese Sinopec, Azerbaijan's Socar were among the overseas oil and gas exploration firms that have done the job.
Sources said Gazprom and Sinopec are expecting to bag more such contracts, but Socar left Bangladesh without completing the drilling job. Chevron is also eyeing to bag a new contract for exploring some untapped onshore blocks.
It is now carrying out an exploration study in some onshore blocks to find out new natural gas prospects.
Chevron intends to perform the study outside the purview of its existing PSCs (production-sharing contracts) for exploration in three onshore gas fields-Bibiyana, Jalalabad and Moulvibazar.
It aims to find potentially drillable prospects in the unexplored areas of 11 blocks, including 01, 2A, 2B, 3A, 3B, 08, 09, 11, 12, 13 and 14.
The country's overall gas output is around 2,972 million cubic feet per day (mmcfd), including imported LNG to the tune of 576 mmcfd as of May 13, 2020.
