Mexico is offering its first deep-water oil and gas exploration blocks to bidders as part of the historic energy industry overhaul that will open the sector to private investment, FoxNews Latino reported.
The Secretary of Energy said that 10 blocks would go up for bid in September 2016, four of them in the “Lost Belt” in the Gulf of Mexico, the maritime boundary between Mexico and the US. The auction is scheduled for late 2016 to allow multinational companies to analyze the projects.
Since its 2014 reform that ended seven decades of state monopoly on the oil business, Mexico has been awarding exploration and production contracts only on land and in shallow water, according to ABC news.
Meanwhile, country’s oil regulator has awarded all 25 onshore oil contracts on offer in an auction aimed at boosting new Mexican oil companies after having finalized the sector reform last year putting an end to the state-run Pemex’s dominance on the market, Reuters reported. The expected production capacity of the 25 fields is 77,000b/d with estimated future investment of $1.1b.
“This is a triumph for Mexico,” Juan Carlos Zepeda, President of Mexico’s oil regulator CNH said after the auction.
Mexico has seen an oil production decline in the past decade with the current level at 2.2mb/d.
