Sri Lanka Plans 2020 Licensing Round

Sri Lanka plans to invite bids in early 2020 for its second licensing round in seven years, the local Daily Mirror reported March 29.

The south Asian nation will invite bids for exploration of natural gas in the Mannar and Cauvery basins. The licencing round is expected to be the first to come under a new national policy on natural gas, which is due to be put in place by the end of the year.

Sri Lanka expects to start producing natural gas by 2025, according to secretary to the ministry of highways & road development and petroleum resources development Sunil Hettiarachchi. “It will transform our energy mix,” he added.

In 2013, Cairn India made discoveries in the Dorado and Barracuda wells in the Mannar basin. However, the company quit Sri Lanka in 2015 owing to the sharp fall in energy prices.

Earlier this year, the government invited bids for exploration block M2 in Mannar basin off the east coast in which the two Cairn India discoveries lie.