Mexico’s oil industry regulator CNH has finalised seven deep-water contracts for E&P oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
The contracts arose from last December’s Round 1.4 of bidding, which attracted several international companies.
Among the deals are three in the Perdido Fold Belt, comprising two contracts with Chinese company CNOOC and one contract with a joint venture (JV) of France’s Total and Exxon Mobil of the US.
There were four deals in the Salina Basin comprising two with the JV of Total, the UK’s BP and Norway’s Statoil, one with the JV of Malaysia’s Petronas and Mexico’s Sierra Oil and Gas, and one with the JV of Petronas, Sierra and American firm Murphy Oil of El Dorado, Arkansas.
All the contracts have a 35-year lifespan with options to extend by 10 years and then five more years after that.
Early this month Mexico’s state oil firm Pemex and a subsidiary of Australia’s BHP Billiton signed a deal confirming their JV to develop the Trion deep-water field, also in the Gulf of Mexico.
