Ministry to receive Deltana bids Nov.28

Venezuela's energy and mines ministry plans to receive bids for blocks 3 and 5 on the Deltana natural gas platform on November 28, state oil company PDVSA's project leader, Carlos Barbieri, told BNamericas. Government news agency Venpres quoted energy and mines minister Rafael Ramirez as saying the blocks would be awarded by the end of November. However, Barbieri said they would likely be awarded by mid-December. "This will give continuity to the process of awarding licenses in all of the eastern area to build the new industrial complex at Guiria using gas to become a net exporter of this liquid for the first time ," Ramirez said. A total of 12 multinational companies and one local company - Vinccler - signed the framework agreement for the development of non-associated gas deposits in blocks 3 and 5 in September. The energy ministry will set the base amount for each block, and then issue licenses to the highest bidders. Investments related to the Deltana Platform are expected to reach US$4bn in the first 6-8 years, creating 20,000 jobs. The signatory companies are the UK's BG, BP and Shell, France's Total, US-based ChevronTexaco, ConocoPhillips and Exxon Mobil, Italy's ENI, Russia's Lukoil, Petrocanada, Spain's Repsol-YPF, Norway's Statoil, and local company Vinccler. "They are all still competing, none have excused themselves, and all of them are acting according to the rules," Barbieri said. ChevronTexaco and Statoil won blocks 2 and 4 respectively in February. Meanwhile, the energy ministry is continuing technical studies with the BPTT Trinidad and Tobago unit of British oil and gas company BP to unify BPTT's offshore Kapok gas field with block 1 of the Deltana platform, Barbieri said. The estimated investment to develop the whole Deltana platform is about US$4bn, Barbieri said.