ISLAMABAD: The Petroleum Division (PD) has planned to auction 27 new Exploration and Production (E&P) blocks for stepping up oil and gas drilling activities in different hydrocarbon potential areas of the country.
“The advertisement for the award of 20 E&P blocks will be given in the first week of October, while seven offshore blocks will be offered in December,” a senior official privy to petroleum sector developments told APP.
The official said that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government was fully aware of the prevailing energy situation in the country and taking all possible measures to meet the existing and future needs in the oil and gas sector in an efficient manner.
“The country’s total sedimentary area is around 827,268 square kilometres, out of which 320,741 km or 39pc of the area was under exploration,” he said.
The official said the country’s existing gas reserves were depleting at the rate of 9.5 per cent annually and unfortunately, E&P companies have made no significant discovery since long.
Currently, he said, local gas production was around 3.7 Billion Cubic Feet (BCF) per day against the demand of six BCF/day.
“The previous government did not award even a single E&P block during its five-year tenure due to which the gap between demand and supply of gas continues to increase gradually,” he added.
Cognizant of the situation, the official said the PTI government, after coming into power, had started bidding round in September 2018 and subsequently awarded almost 10 new E&P blocks to expedite drilling activities.
It may be mentioned here that a new block takes almost four to five years in producing any result as it involves different phases including studies, testing, drilling, and installation of processing plans and pipelines.