ONGC invites offers for enhancing production from its marginal nomination fields

19 Aug , 2021 By : Kanchan Joshi

MUMBAI: State-run Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (ONGC) has issued a notice inviting offer (NIO) seeking partners for enhancement of production from its marginal nomination fields in line with its goal of maximizing recovery from its producing fields, the company said today.

Under the NIO, 11 onland contract areas comprising 43 oil and gas fields with total in-place oil and oil equivalent of gas (O OEG) volume of about 160 MMtoe (million metric tonnes of oil equivalent) are offered to interested companies through an international competitive bidding (ICB) route. These contract areas are spread across the states of Gujarat, Assam, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.

Eligible companies (Indian or foreign), either alone or in consortium with other companies, may bid for one or more contract areas. The bidders are required to fulfil the requisite technical and financial criteria as per the NIO conditions and the bids would be evaluated on the basis of revenue sharing from the incremental production.

ONGC is inviting the bids through its e-bidding portal by 3 December. A pre-bid conference will be held on 20 October 2021 (mode/ venue to be intimated later).

Bidders interested in studying the data can purchase field information docket and data packages. Upon request, the interested companies shall be able to access the data viewing facility at IRS, Ahmedabad and visit the fields, if required, the company said.

Salient features of the ONGC offering include—complete marketing and pricing freedom to sell hydrocarbons on arm’s length basis through competitive bidding and selecting partners on revenue sharing basis. The revenue will be shared on incremental production over and above the baseline production under business-as-usual (BAU) scenario, the company said.

Other features include: a contract period of 15 years with an option to extend by five years; a reduction of 10% in the royalty rate for incremental production of natural gas over and above BAU scenario; easy to administer revenue sharing model-based contract; continuous exploration permitted during the contract period including the right to explore all kinds of hydrocarbon; no past investment/ expenditure incurred by the ONGC to be shared or paid by the contractor; ease of entry/ exit and incentive for partners to enhance production beyond committed incremental production.