Govt offers two discovered oil and gas fields, one coal bed methane block in special bidding round

The government has offered two discovered oil and gas fields in Mumbai offshore and a coal bed methane field in West Bengal for bidding in the latest Discovered Small Fields (DSF) bid round, regulator DGH said on Monday.

In a notice on its website, the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) said, notice inviting offer will be launched on May 28 and bids will close on July 15.

"With the objective to augment domestic production of Petroleum and Natural Gas, the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas, Government of India announces the Special DSF Bid Round offering two (02) Discovered Small Field located in Mumbai Offshore (MB/OSDSF/C37/2024 & MB/OSDSF/B15/2024) and one (01) Discovered Coal Bed Methane field located in West Bengal (SR-ONCBM (Raniganj)-2024) through International Competitive Bidding (ICB)," it said.

It however did not give details like reserves. Those may be included in the NIO. DSF was launched in 2016 and since then three rounds have been held.

In the first round, 67 discovered oil and gas fields that were clubbed into 46 contract areas were awarded. These fields had an inplace resource potential of 45 million tonnes of oil and oil equivalent gas.

DSF-II in August 2018 offered 25 contract areas that were made up of 59 fields. These had an inplace resource potential of 190 million tonnes of oil and oil equivalent gas. In June 2021, DSF-III offered 32 contract areas, comprising 75 fields with inplace resource potential of 232 million tonnes of oil and oil equivalent.