New Delhi : Oil behemoth ONGC is set to hire international oil services majors to ramp up its output from its two aging fields.
State-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp has received interests from oil services majors Halliburton, Schlumberger and Baker Hughes in bidding for contracts, its director (onshore) Ved Prakash Mahawar said.
The two fields, which are shortlisted for production enhancement contracts by private players, are Kalol in Gujarat and Geleki in Assam. ONGC had signed pacts with Halliburton and Schlumberger in December 2016 to enhance the output from Kalol and Geleki, respectively. However, the agreements were rescinded later as the government objected to ONGC awarding contracts on a discretionary basis instead of floating a tender for them.
ONGC then decided to take the bidding route to award contracts for the two mature fields. “The three companies, Halliburton, Schlumberger and Baker Hughes, have shown interest in participating in the tender process. They will now study the data for the two fields, after which we will hold pre-bid consultations followed by bidding,” Mahawar said.
The last date for bidding for production enhancement contracts for the two fields is March 12, he added.
This is the first instance of such a model being adopted in the country. Under this model, the service provider will be paid a fee for every incremental unit of oil or gas produced from the fields, apart from maintaining the baseline production.
If ONGC benefits from the production enhancement contracts for the two fields, the company might go for such arrangements for other ageing fields as well.
