DUBAI: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan's hopes to be self-sufficient in oil production were dashed as the expected oil and gas reserves in the Arabia Sea were not found, reports Gulf News.
Exploration mission has been stopped off the coast of Karachi as the drillers hit the dry 'wells' despite drilling more than 5500 metres deep into the sea.
It was officially announced on Saturday that the much-celebrated offshore drilling in Kekra-1 had been stopped because no reserves were found.
The operators of the well have decided to plug it in the coming days, according to reports in Pakistani media.
Around 18 attempts have been made in the past, but all remained unsuccessful despite encouraging data from each drilling, says the official.
"We have only drilled 18 holes for oil. Only the 18th attempt. India had offshore discoveries after 43rd attempt, Libya after 58th, and Norway, another country which nobody believed could have reserves, drilled 78 holes between 1954 to 1963 and then hit it big," Syed Ali Haider Zaidi, Federal Minister for Maritime Affairs, told Gulf News.
He said that hope and resilience is the way forward as the government would continue to look for alternate resources.
Talking to a private news channel, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Petroleum Nadeem Babar announced that the offshore drilling in Kekra-1 did not yield desired results.
Pakistanis were exceptionally hopeful about finding large oil and gas reserves in the country's territorial waters in the Arabian Sea. Kekra-1 well at Indus G-Block is located around 280 kilometres southwest of Karachi coast near Iran.
The bad news of failure to discover the oil and gas reserves came as a big blow to Prime Minister Imran Khan's government which has pinned great expectation on oil discovery and had already celebrated its expected discovery.
In March this year, Prime Minister Imran had said Pakistan would not need to import oil after reserves were found near Karachi coast.
"We are hopeful of finding large reserves of gas and oil in the sea near Karachi. The nation should pray for this and I will soon share good news regarding this," Khan had told reporters in Islamabad. God willing the reserves will be so large that we will not need to import any oil," Imran had said in an earlier statement.
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