South Korea’s GS Energy has won a 3% stake in the Abu Dhabi onshore concession known as ADCO.
The Asian firm joins France’s Total and Japan’s Inpex, which were the first IOCs to be awarded shares in the fields.
With 10% Total, long-standing partner of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) got the lion’s share of the fields, while Inpex was awarded 5%.
The $676mn agreement, according to Reuters, will last for 40 years and will help the Asian country meet its increasing energy demand.
The ADCO concession covers 15 onshore oilfields and have production capacity of 1.6mn barrels of oil a day, with plans to reach 1.8mn by 2017.
After the deal, the stake is considered South Korea’s single biggest oil asset, providing around 800mn barrels of crude over the 40-year period.
A total of nine Asian and Western companies have bid for stakes in the ADCO concession, which was previously signed for 75-years but expired in January 2014 and was due for renewal.
BP and Royal Dutch Shell are believed to be the two major contenders for the fields but reports have suggested that the two firms have been struggling to meet Abu Dhabi’s demand for a hefty sign-on fee of $2.2bn.
Abu Dhabi is yet to award the remaining 22% stake earmarked for foreign oil firms.
