Iraq Opens Bids for Oil Fields
By VOA News
30 June 2009
Iraq auctioned contracts to run eight huge oil and gas fields Tuesday in an effort to raise more oil revenue to rebuild the battered nation.
A consortium including BP and China's CNPC accepted a contract to expand production in the largest oil field on offer.
A group that included ExxonMobil rejected the terms, which offered the companies a fee of $2 a barrel for production above a certain minimum amount.
The oil companies had asked for about twice that amount or more. The BP group revised its bid and won the contract.
Some of the smaller oil fields attracted no bidders, other bids asked for far more than Baghdad's $2 a barrel offer.
Iraqi officials say the goal is to boost oil production to about four million barrels of oil a day, which is almost double the current output.
Some lawmakers have criticized the pending deals, adding some political uncertainty for investors who already have concerns about security.
Iraq has the world's third-largest known oil reserves, and the oil fields up for bid hold an estimated 43 billion barrels of crude. This is the first significant chance foreign oil companies have had to work in Iraq's oil fields since the industry was nationalized in 1972.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP, AP and Reuters.
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