Hungary’s MOL Group has announced it has made a new discovery of oil reserves in the TAL Block it operates in Pakistan.
This marks the 8th discovery in the block and the MOL’s 12th in the country.
The Makori-Deep-1 exploration well reached its target depth of 5,067 metres on April 17, 2016.
During testing, the well flowed oil and gas in Lockhart-1 formation at a rate of 2,020 barrels per day and 900 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boepd), or 5.4mn standard cubic feet per day, respectively.
As the operating shareholder, MOL is currently responsible for over 80,000 boepd of gross production in the South Asian country.
“We are very proud of our 8th discovery in the MOL-Operated TAL block. This new discovery has de-risked exploration in deeper fault blocks in the TAL block leading to new upside opportunities,” Dr. Berislav Gašo, MOL Group’s E&P COO was quoted in a press release as saying.
“Further, this new discovery will help to improve the energy security of the country. We are thankful to our JV partners as well as the Government of Pakistan for their solid support. Our exploration and development efforts in Pakistan are crucial building blocks of the success of MOL’s New Upstream Program, which aims at making MOL Group’s portfolio self-funding even in a low oil price environment,” he said.
MOL is among the few foreign IOCs operating in Pakistan and operates on a joint venture basis with the Oil & Gas Development Company Ltd. (OGDCL), a Pakistani government-mandated exploration and production company.
The other IOCs working in Pakistan are Italy’s ENI, Austria’s OMV, Chinese Group UEPL, BHP Billiton, Tullow Oil, PEL and Kuwait’s Kufpec, the only GCC-based company.
MOL is also part of an exploration and production consortium made up of Pakistan’s state-owned players including PPL, POL and GHPL, apart from OGDCL.
MOL has a well-established track record of over 17 years in Pakistan and holds equity stakes in five blocks in the country.
As the Pakistani government embarks on its ‘aggressive exploration’ campaign, it has plans to offer open bids to lure international oil and gas companies.
Speaking to Oil & Gas Middle East on the sidelines of the 7th Gulf Intelligence UAE Energy Forum in Abu Dhabi in January, Jam Kamal Khan, Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Resources told the magazine that the government had allocated 40 blocks last year through open bids, and this year intends to tender for about 20 more blocks all over Pakistan.
“A lot of these blocks will be in Balochistan, Punjab, Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa [provinces], as well as some offshore blocks,” Khan revealed.
