DFS-I to start oil production by 2021

Hyderabad: Twenty two companies, who were awarded 30 contracts in the round-1 bidding of Discovered Small Fields (DSF), are expected to start their oil production by 2020-21, a top official said on Wednesday.

“In March 2017, we signed the contracts with 23 companies for the round 1 bidding of the DSF. According to the field plans that we have received so far, we are hopeful that by 2020-21 all fields including the offshore ones will be able to start their production. The onshore fields, however, are likely to start earlier,” the director general of hydrocarbons Atanu Chakraborty said to the media on the sidelines of a ministry of petroleum and gas conference. 

The second round of the DSF, which will have 60 blocks for bidding, will have larger landarea following feedback. Among the challenges that hurt DSF-I also include isolated places and technical issues. 

“Smaller areas (in DSF-I) didn’t help as it was not optimal technically. So we proposed to increase the land area in DSF-II,” Mr Chakraborty said.

When asked about the response for the 55 gas and oil blocks under the Open Acerage Licensing Policy (OALP), Mr Chakraborty, citing the interest shown by 120 firms to access the database of the National Data Repository, said that he was hopeful about a good response.

However, he hinted at extending the deadline for the OALP due to the holidays in March-end. “With barely two weeks to go for the cut-off date (April 3) for the bids, we may consider extending the date by about 15 days.”