Timor Gap and Timor-Leste JV Gas Project Majority owned by Santos
Santos, the majority joint venture owner in Timor-Leste, announced on Monday that Timor Gap, a state-owned Timor-Leste oil company has acquired a 16 percent interest in Bayu-Undan's gas project. Timor Gap is now a member of the Bayu-Undan JV which includes SK E&S, INPEX, Eni, and Tokyo Timor Sea Resources. The joint venture partners manage jointly the Bayu-Undan Upstream Gas Project, which includes an offshore oil field and offshore production facilities and processing in Timor-Leste. After the inclusion of Timor Gap, Australian oil and natural gas giant Santos has a 36.5% stake.
Timor Resource to Drill 5 Wells in Timor-Leste
Australian privately-owned oil and gas company Timor Resources said it has commissioned Eastern Drilling to commence drilling operations in the Southeast Asian country of Timor-Leste.One of the world’s last frontiers for oil and gas, Timor-Leste's most recent drilling undertaken onshore was nearly 50 years ago in 1972, when Timor-Leste (then East Timor) was under Indonesian rule.In 2017, Timor Resources made history by securing the rights to explore and develop approximately 2,000 km2 of under-explored onshore acreage on Timor-Leste’s south coast.
E.Timor, Australia to Ratify Maritime, Gas Deal This Year
East Timor and Australia are set to ratify a maritime border treaty, which regulates how the two countries will share revenue from the offshore Greater Sunrise natural gas field, later this year, East Timor's foreign minister said.Dionisio Babo Soares told Reuters on Tuesday the ratification could take place on Aug. 30, the anniversary of a referendum that gave the small Pacific nation, one of the world's poorest, its long-awaited independence in 1999.Signed in March 2018, the historic treaty resolved a long-running dispute over the Timor Sea border…
Pertamina Plans to Develop South China Sea Border Areas
Energy company Pertamina plans to explore for oil and gas in areas close to Indonesia's maritime border in the South China Sea to assert the country's territorial rights, the upstream director of the state-owned company said. "The government needs to have activities around the borders and one of Pertamina's strategies is to support this," Syamsu Alam told Reuters in an interview on Monday. He said Indonesia had lost sovereignty over two disputed islands in the past because it was not developing those areas.
Climate Deal Details Remain Elusive
Exhausted global climate negotiators resumed wrestling over the language of an agreement on Thursday morning after talks that dragged through the night failed to bridge gaps between rich and developing countries. French Foreign Minister Lauren Fabius, who is chairing the U.N. conference, said he still planned to issue a penultimate draft on Thursday afternoon with as few disagreements or bracketed passages as possible to pave the way for a last round of revisions. "We will now try to move towards a final agreement," he told U.N.
Joint Petroleum Development in South China Sea Makes Sense
Shared development of oil, gas and possibly other natural resources is the most promising option for reducing tensions in the South China Sea and should be the focus of efforts to improve diplomatic relations between China and its coastal neighbors. Joint development agreements (JDAs) are already common across Asia. Most of the countries with a disputed claim in the South China Sea have signed at least one joint agreement to explore for oil and gas, either in the South China Sea or in neighbouring areas like the Gulf of Thailand and the East China Sea, so there are plenty of precedents to draw on.
