New developments reported over the Pak Afghan border petroleum exploration zone

New developments reported over the Pak Afghan border petroleum exploration zone

ISLAMABAD - New developments reported over the Pak Afghan border petroleum exploration zone.

The federal government is looking to establish a new zone called Frontier Zone near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border for exploration and production activities, according to a local media house. link

The zone is likely to fall under the amended Petroleum Policy 2012. The matter will be tabled at the Council of Common Interests (CCI) which will meet today with Prime Minister Imran Khan heading the meeting.

The Council of Common Interests (CCI) will discuss a 16-point agenda during the meeting. The chief ministers of all the provinces have been summoned to deliberate on different topics including population census, LNG import, amendment in the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) Ordinance 2002 and Alternate Energy Policy 2019.

The report stated that the well-head price for the new zone has not been finalized, as it will be finalized after amendments to the Petroleum Policy 2012 are approved by the CCI.

The zone will be called Zone-I (F) covering Kharan, Pishin, and FATA which are reported to have tremendous unexplored hydrocarbon reservoirs estimated to be over 20 trillion cubic feet (TCF).

According to the report, the well-head price for the new zone has been proposed at $7 per MMBTU, but it is yet to be finalized.

The report quoted an official saying that a new zone for high-risk frontier regions will be set up with better returns, offering good prospects of better hydrocarbon discovery and production.