The Government of Bangladesh and Petrobangla have officially launched the Bangladesh 2024 Offshore Bid Round, inviting international oil companies (IOCs) to explore opportunities in the country's oil and gas sector.
The bid encompasses nine shallow-sea and 15 deep-sea blocks.
The shallow-sea blocks available for bidding are SS-01, 02, 03, 05, 06, 07, 08, 10 and 11, while the deep-sea blocks include DS-08 to DS-22.
Petrobangla has outlined specific qualification criteria for bidders, which include a minimum offshore daily production requirement and mandatory global exploration experience.
IOCs can bid for multiple blocks, with the prospect of signing contracts under the new Bangladesh Offshore Model Production Sharing Contract 2023.
The qualification criteria mandates that individual bidders or at least one member of a joint venture must operate with a minimum offshore daily production of at least 15,000 barrels of oil or 150 million standard cubic feet of gas.
In a separate announcement, TGS, in partnership with Petrobangla and SLB, has acquired a 2D multi-client seismic data survey over 75,000km² across all 24 blocks on offer in the bid round.
TGS multi-client executive vice-president David Hajovsky said: “The Bengal Fan is one of the world's largest deep-water fans with significant evidence of working petroleum systems. It is widely considered one of the most extensively underexplored frontier regions.
“With limited existing offshore Bangladesh data, this new high-quality seismic, combined with the revised production sharing contract 2023 (PSC), is a critical component for companies to evaluate and submit competitive bids for the blocks on offer in the bid round.”
