Aral Sea to start exploration at eastern part of Aral Seas

The source said that in next stage the company will start to explore Eastern Aral. The source added that it is difficult territory and requires serious investments, but the company should continue to search for new fields to ensure efficiency of the project.

According to the source, currently the company revealed about 15 billion cubic meters of natural gas and about 1 million tonnes of oil. The perspectives of the block confirmed and the company was the first to find out oil in Aral, but its reserves do not meet commercial goals of the project.

The PSA for the Aral block was signed in August 2006 for 35 years and took effect in January 2007. The PSA was signed in Auguest 2006. The project is implemented by Uzbekneftegaz National Holding Company, LUKOIL Overseas, CNPC International (China), and KNOC Aral (Korea).

In line with the PSA, Uzbekistan will possess 50% of product, while consortium participants will receive 10% each in the initial stage of the project.

Aral license block is located in northern-western Uzbekistan and includes the Uzbek part of the Aral Sea, as well as bordering land and transit zones. During the project implementation in 2007-2009, over 3,000 meters of seismic works were conducted at dry land, sea and transit zone. In the result, six perspective structures were revealed, documented and prepared to deep drilling. These are Western Aral, Umid, Aq-Tepa and Shagala.

In 2011, the consortium completed exploration programme fully and invested US$110.2 million. New Western Aral field was revealed. In August 2013, the operator completed additional exploration works at western Aral with drilling three wells and conducting 3D seismic exploration.

The volume of investments made up US$32 million. Based on the result of the exploration works, it is planned to develop feasibility studies and agree commercial terms of the PSA.