DILI, 14 june 2022 (TATOLI) – Timor-Leste’s National Petroleum and Minerals Authority (ANPM) continues to promote the 13 remaining of the 18 blocks to attract more foreign investors to apply for the exploration of oil and gas in Timor-Leste.
“We want to continuously promote our 13 blocks to ensure that we could attract more investors to the country,” the President of ANPM, Florentino Soares Ferreira said in his speech at the 4th Timor-Leste Energy and Mining Summit, in City-8 Hall, in Dili.
The remaining 13 blocks include four onshore blocks – G, E, D, and C, and nine offshore blocks – J, I, K, H, L, O, N, Q, and M.
In october 2019, the government launched the nation’s second licensing round, announcing a total of 18 new blocks for a public tender for Production Sharing Contracts (PSC). These 18 blocks cover a large percentage of the total on and offshore area of the country.
On april 2022, the Government of Timor-Leste, through the Ministry of Petroleum and Minerals (MPM) officially announced five oil firms as the ‘Bids Winners’ of the second licensing round for Timor-Leste petroleum exploration – Timor Gap E.P (State-Owned Oil Company), ETO Lda (Timorese Private Oil Firm), Kazakhstani HTS Exploration Lda, Eni Australia B.V, and Australian Santos Ltd.
Onshore blocks A, B, and F were awarded to state-owned Timor Gap, privately-owned ETO Lda, and Kazakhstani HTS Exploration, respectively. Meanwhile, the Italian Eni and Australia’s Santos won the offshore blocks P and R, respectively. ANPM still has 13 blocks remaining to be promoted for foreign investors to bid for oil and gas exploration in these blocks.
Ferreira revealed that the ASEAN Energy outlook predicted that the South East Asia energy demands are expected to rise by 60% by 2040, yet over 40% of the energy is imported, saying, therefore, this statistic means that Timor-Leste needed to work on its 15 new projects and the 13 remaining blocks that are still open for the market.
“Timor-Leste, despite its land mass, but we still have relative vast offshore area,” Ferreira concluded.
Journalist: Filomeno Martins
Editor: Nelia Borges
