A Chinese company, for the first time, will start drilling four onshore gas wells of the Titas gas field by October next, officials said.
State-owned Petrobangla's wholly-owned subsidiary Bangladesh Gas Fields Company Ltd (BGFCL) has already inked a deal with the Chinese Sinopec International Petroleum Service Corporation in this regard, a senior BGFCL official told the FE Saturday.
He said the Sinopec was scheduled to start drilling activities this month, but an allegation over its awarding procedure delayed the project work.
The allegation was that the BGFCL board of directors awarded the project to the Sinopec without any approval from the cabinet committee of government purchase.
"Actually, the BGFCL board has 'power' to award such projects," he clarified.
The BGFCL, the owner of Titas gas field, awarded the drilling job to the Sinopec after a competitive bidding where the country's lone oil and gas exploration firm Bapex was barred from taking part in the bidding.
Russian oil and gas major Gazprom was the only other bidder of the four well drilling programnme, but was found non-responsive as it did not provide detailed planning for drilling, said the BGFCL official.
The four wells to be drilled by Sinopec are -- Titas-23, Titas-24, Titas-25 and Titas-26 - and are located in Brahmanbaria district, some 100 km off the capital.
Titas is Bangladesh's second largest producing gas-field after the Chevron-operated Bibiyana field.
This field is currently producing around 522 million cubic feet per day (mmcfd) from 21 producing wells against an overall production capacity of 518 mmcfd.
In addition to drilling of the four wells, the Sinopec will also be responsible for third-party engineering services regarding the drilling of the wells.
The third-party engineering services include cementation, mud logging, wire-line logging, supplying explosives, detonator core analysis, drill-stem testing wire-line or slick-line operation, supply of drill bits and nozzles, supply of mud and completion chemicals.
The Chinese firm has submitted performance guarantee worth $5.0 million to carry out the drilling job.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) along with the Bangladesh government will bear the costs of drilling activities.
The BGFCL, however, will provide necessary materials and complete civil works to facilitate the Sinopec completing the drilling programme as per the contract, said the BGFCL top official.
The Sinopec will bring in one drilling rig to complete the project works.
This is the Sinopec's first-ever involvement in Bangladesh's oil and gas exploration activities, but it is the country's second appointment of any international oil company to drill wells as contractor.
Gazprom was the first foreign company to drill gas wells in Bangladesh on contract basis.
It was awarded a 10-well drilling job in April 2012.
Other international oil companies active in Bangladesh operate under production-sharing contracts or in joint ventures with the Bapex.
mazizur.rahman@outlook.com
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