Petrobangla—the Oil, Gas and Mineral Resources Corporation—has finally decided to extract oil from the country’s first two oil fields at Haripur and Kailashtila in
Sylhet discovered more than two decades ago.
Petrobangla chairman Hossain Monsur at a press briefing on Sunday said production at the two oil fields would start within a year.
He said the decision to go for commercial production at the Haripur and kailashtila had been taken on the basis of a recent 3 dimensional seismic survey and well-log
reports that provided detailed information about the potentials of the two oil reserves.
Monsur said that the two fields would have a combined reserve of around 137 million barrels although 55 million barrels or around 7 million tonnes could be recovered
from the two oil fields.
Prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who is also the energy minister, instructed Petrobangla to take immediate steps to tap the oil resource so that Sylhet Gas Fields
Limited, the owner of the two oil fields, could start production in one year, said Monsur.
The Petrobangla chairman earlier on Sunday morning presented to the prime minister a summery of the plan to start commercial production at the two oil fields.
Being engaged by Sylhet Gas Fields Ltd, Bangladesh Petroleum Exploration Company (BAPEX) conducted the field operation for 3D seismic survey over Kailastila and
Haripur gas fields six months back.
Appreciating the BAPEX seismic team, Badrul Imam,
an energy expert and teacher at geology department of Dhaka University, who was present at the press briefing, said the initiative would have been taken much earlier.
‘BAPEX and the Sylhet Gas Fields Ltd took interest in the two old oil fields which were neglected for years… We are hopeful we can become an oil producing country
though the estimated reserve in the two fields are too little,’ Badrul added.
Mansur also announced that Petrobangla would also drill deeper up to 6,000 metres to explore oil in the big gas fields like Titas gas field in Brahmanbaria.
Petrobangla exploration division discovered Haripur oil field in Sylhet in 1986. The oil field was leased out to a foreign company Scimitar for producing oil.
Scimitar extracted 544,100 barrel or 68,873 tonnes oil from the field between 1987 and 1994 and abandoned the oil field when they found the extraction was not
profitable.
After appearing as a company under Petrobangla, BAPEX discovered another oil field at Kailashtila in Sylhet in 1989.
BAPEX drilled an exploration well there and conducted successful drill stem test (DST) in the two oil-layers out of five.
-With New Age input
