Chevron Secures Bulgarian Shale Concession

Chevron Corp. has won a tender to explore shale gas deposits in northeastern Bulgaria.

"Chevron, which won the tender, offered the government a 30-million-euro (43-million-dollar) bonus for the licence to explore a shale gas field near Novi Pazar. It won in competition with BNK Petroleum," Economy and Energy Minister Traicho Traikov said Saturday.

Two more tenders for shale gas exploration in the same region in northeastern Bulgaria were still underway with offers to be submitted by end-June, Traikov added.

Initial estimates of the companies interested in shale gas exploration in Bulgaria put the country's deposits between 300 billion and 1.0 trillion cubic metres, he explained.

Source: Focus