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Iraq is still planning to hold a licensing auction to award three major gas field licences as scheduled on 1st October, but according to Dow Jones, an Iraqi oil official has conceded that a delay is possible.

Eleven international companies have paid the participation fees. They are reported to include Italy's Edison (EDN.MI), France's Total (TOTF.PA), South Korea's KOGAS, Russia's TNK-BP (TNBPI.RTS), Turkiye Petrolleri (TPAO), India's Oil & Natural Gas Corp (ONGC.BO), Kuwait Energy, and Itochu of Japan.

The Iraqi oil official said the auction could be delayed for a few weeks to give companies enough time to study a model contract submitted to them last week.

We understand that several companies have requested more time, and the companies have been consulted as to whether they would all prefer this.

An oil executive says the companies have been given until Wednesday to reply.

Earlier, Abdul Mahdy al-Ameedi, head of the state-run Petroleum Contracts and Licensing Directorate, said he was still intending to hold the auction on Oct. 1.

Click here for more details of the gas fields being auctioned.

(Sources: Reuters, Dow Jones)

AKnews quotes a media source in Najaf, 160km southwest of Baghdad, as saying that the municipality will set regulations for notification when public property is put up for sale, rent, or auction.

A recent report from the Services Commission highlighted a lack of public notification when state property comes up for sale or rental which prevents many interested parties from participating in transactions as they are not informed of them.

Mohammah Khuzai warned that these failings were not only compromising equal opportunities for investors but having negative effect on public funds as the lack of competition often led to properties failing to reach market value levels at auction.

"The report included several recommendations to combat corruption like putting a billboard in the city’s Maydan square", Khuzai continued.

This central “municipal billboard” would advise the public of forthcoming auctions and other opportunities related to state properties.

“The recommendations also demanded that notices are posted on the same day they are published in the Official newspaper."

Najaf council have voted in favour of implementing the committee’s recommendations.

(Source: AKnews)

AFP reports that 90 percent of the $1.9m batch of US-purchased computers destined for schoolchildren but allegedly sold off on the cheap have been recovered.

As we reported on Saturday, an unnamed senior official at Umm Qasr port had reportedly misappropriated the gift and auctioned the computers for just $45,700.

But customs chief Nofal Salim denied the claim, saying the sale was in accordance with a legal disposal procedure for all goods not claimed by the addressee 90 days after their arrival in Iraq.

"On May 19 we received a list from the port of Umm Qasr of containers arriving more than 90 days earlier and which had not been claimed," Salim said.

"No container belonging to the American military appeared on the list.

"However, there were two belonging to a company named Global, although there was no indication that they were destined for the education authorities in Babil province."

Global did not submit a claim for the containers until August 22, six months after their arrival, Salim said.

"The customs service in the south cancelled the sale and has recovered more than 90 percent of the cargo, which will be sent to the Umm Qasr port where the company can get them back."

But in a statement received on Saturday the US military disputed Salim's version of events.

"The disposition of the shipment was unknown until early April when the two containers, containing the computers, were identified through shipping documents," a spokesman from the US army's southern division told AFP.

"Once identified, US forces began coordinating transportation for the containers and computers from the port to Babil province.

"During this process the containers were declared abandoned by custom officials and subsequently put up for and sold at auction."

The US army commander in southern Iraq, Major General Vincent Brooks, called on Friday for "an immediate investigation into the actions of the Umm Qasr official."

Umm Qasr is a large port, and corruption issues led the British military to dismiss many officials there when they administered the facility following the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

(Source: AFP)

Reuters reports that Russian energy company Lukoil and its partners have issued a tender for seismic surveys at Iraq's West Qurna-2 oilfield, according to a statement published on Saturday.

Lukoil, which along with Norway's Statoil won a contract to develop the field, invited companies to bid for carrying out 3D field seismic surveys at the oilfield, with a deadline of Sept. 26, according to a statement published in the Assabah newspaper.

Lukoil and Statoil signed a 20-year deal to develop the 12.9-billion-barrel West Qurna Phase Two oilfield in southern Iraq, in an auction in December, pledging to boost output to a plateau target of 1.8 million barrels per day (bpd).

Production at West Qurna will hit 120,000 bpd in 2012, a senior executive from Statoil said in April.

(Source: Reuters)

The U.S. military is demanding to know what happened to $1.9 million worth of computers purchased by American taxpayers, and intended for Iraqi schoolchildren, that have instead been auctioned off by Iraqi officials for less than $50,000.

Reports from Associated Press and al Jazeera say the shipment of computers intended for schoolchildren in the central Babil province was auctioned by a senior Iraqi official at the southern port of Umm Qasr on Aug. 16 for $45,700 — before the computers could be sent to the province.

"United States Division-South Commander Maj. Gen. Vincent Brooks called for an immediate investigation into the actions of the Umm Qasr official to determine why computers destined for children to facilitate their education were approved for auction," said an American Milatary statement.

The port director, Talib Bayesh, told The Associated Press that the equipment had been sitting in the port for more than 90 days and that, according to the law, any items sitting in the port for more than three months without being claimed could be confiscated by the port and sold at public auction.

Transparency International's 2009 corruption perceptions index ranked Iraq as one of the world's most corrupt nations - 176th out of 180 countries.

(Sources: Associated Press, al Jazeera)

Iraq, site of the world’s third-largest oil reserves, will hold a third bidding round for gas fields which will take place on October 1, an Oil Ministry official has confirmed, according to a report from Bloomberg.

“Definitive model contracts and final tender protocols will be ready on September 10, and the bidding process will be on October 1,” Abdul Mahdy al-Ameedi, deputy director general at Iraq’s Petroleum Contracts and Licensing Directorate, said in a telephone interview.

“We expect the round to be a success, it is now all going fine and everything will be on time,” al-Ameedi said.

It held two licensing rounds last year for oil and gas investments, and the third is specifically for the gas fields Akkas, Mansouriya and Siba, which Iraq is eager to develop for domestic power generation as well as export revenue.

You can find more details of the gas fields here.

(Source: Bloomberg)

Energy companies from the UAE are interested in investing as Iraq’s oil and natural-gas industries, a government official said.

“There are indications that the UAE will have a place in the petroleum and energy sector,” Abdullah Ibrahim Al Shehi, the country’s ambassador to Iraq, said on Monday at a gathering of diplomatic officials in Abu Dhabi.

Mubadala Development Co, the Abu Dhabi government-owned investor, is among companies that may be interested in expanding to Iraq, Al Shehi said. There is about $5 billion worth of bilateral trade between the UAE and Iraq, and that value is expected to increase to $7 billion next year, he said.

UAE property companies and airlines are looking to Iraq as a market for expansion. Ethidad Airways of Abu Dhabi started flights to Baghdad in April, and Dubai-based Emirates, the Middle East’s largest airline, plans to start flights to Baghdad this Year. Budget carrier FlyDubai travels to northern Iraq.

Abu Dhabi property developer Bloom signed a $12.5 billion [14.6 trillion Iraqi dinars] contract in March for a housing project west of Baghdad. Dana Gas, based in the UAE emirate of Sharjah, produces fuel in northern Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region.

Iraq, seeking to boost oil and gas output, held two bidding rounds last year to auction rights to develop hydrocarbon deposits. The country is planning a third round for three gas areas this year.

UAE companies previously wanted to invest in Iraq’s oil industry and lost out as other international firms won development rights, Al Shehi said. No U.A.E. companies qualified to bid in Iraq’s first two auctions last year, according to data from the Iraqi government.

Mubadala, which has exploration and production assets in Kazakhstan and Thailand, has joint ventures in the U.A.E. and Bahrain with U.S. producer Occidental Petroleum Corp., a partner to develop the Zubair oil field in Iraq. The Los Angeles-based company may sell part of its stake in the deposit to the Abu Dhabi investment arm, Chief Executive Officer Ray Irani said in October.

Petromal, an oil and gas explorer funded by members of Abu Dhabi’s ruling family, aimed to bid for Iraqi assets in auctions last year along with partner Premier Oil, the U.A.E. company’s CEO Radhwan Al Saadi said in an interview in Feb. 2009. Neither company qualified to bid in the auctions last year.

(Source: Arabian Business)

Iraq will produce natural gas in two years, and will become one of the most important gas exporters to Europe, according to a report from Aswat al-Iraq.

As we recently reported, the fate of the three gas fields of Akkas, Mansouriya and Siba will be decided in October.

A source from the Iraqi Oil Ministry told Aswat al-Iraq news agency on Monday that factors such as production levels and costs will be considered in evaluating the bids.

“Iraq will use only about 50% of the produced gas to generate electricity, while the rest will be exported,” the source added.

(Source: Aswat al-Iraq)

Related articles:

• Gas Auction Postponed, but Terms Sweetened
• Iraq to Import Gas from Iran
• Iraq Confirms Transit Of Iranian Gas To Europe

Following last week's announcement that Iraq will import gas from Iran, the country's senior deputy oil minister confirmed on Monday that it has tol Iran that it is ready to allow the transit of Iranian natural gas destined for Syria and Mediterranean countries.

Kareem Al Luaby gave the confirmation to Dow Jones Newswires by telephone from Baghdad, but gave no further details.

Iranian Student News Agency quoted a top Iranian gas official on Sunday as saying that the Iraqi oil and electricity ministers declared that the Iraqi government has permitted Iran's gas transit to Syria and Mediterranean states.

Javad Oji, managing director of the National Iranian Gas Co. said that the project would need a pipeline with a daily capacity of 110 million cubic meters to go through Iraq. This differs from the previously-reported figure of "300 million cubic feet", which is about 8.5 million cubic meters.

Meantime, an Iraqi oil official said that a delegation from the Iranian oil ministry was in Baghdad two weeks ago and met with Al Luaby and other senior officials in the Iraqi oil ministry. The official, however, said that he wasn't informed about the outcome of the meetings.

Earlier, another Iraqi oil ministry official said that such a decision would need to be made by the Iraqi parliament. "In addition to that, we don't have the infrastructure to transit Iranian gas to other countries," he said.

Iraq, which has the fifth highest gas reserves in the region, is trying to hold a bidding round for three major gas fields, with the aim of exporting half of the produced gas. However, international companies have been complaining that Iraq hasn't got the infrastructure to export its gas.

Iran holds the world's second largest reserves of gas. But plans to develop LNG schemes have been hit by the reluctance of Western oil companies to invest in them because of the sanctions imposed by Western countries on the country because of its attempts to acquire nuclear energy.

(Source: Dow Jones Newswires)

Related articles:

• Gas Auction Postponed, but Terms Sweetened
• Iraq to Import Gas from Iran
• Iraq to Produce Natural Gas in 2 Years

A memorandum of understanding signed with Iraqi officials calls for the import of as much as 300 million cubic feet (8.6 million cubic meters) of gas per day from Iran, an Iranian director said.

Javad Oji, a managing director at the National Iranian Gas Co (NIGC), said an Iranian delegation traveled to Iraq at the weekend to sign preliminary arrangements for Iranian natural gas exports through Iraq, the Iranian Oil Ministry's Petroenergy Information Network reports.

The director said the deal on the table includes the delivery of as much as 300 million cubic feet of gas per day for a period of five to seven years.

Both sides agreed to form technical, financial and legal working groups to hammer out the details of a final contract.

Delegates at the talks discussed the possibility of shipping Iranian gas to Europe through gas transit networks in Syria, he added.

Iran would most likely pump its gas to Iraq via two pipelines that cross the border at Dehloran and Khorramshahr.

Iran is pushing ahead with plans to build a natural gas pipeline to Pakistan. The country, which holds some of the largest natural gas deposits in the world, has also petitioned for a role in the Nabucco pipeline to Europe. Western supporters of the project ruled out that possibility, however.

(Sources: UPI, MEED, Tehran Times)

Related articles:

• Talabani Calls for Enhanced Trade Ties with Iran
• Gas Auction Postponed, but Terms Sweetened
• Iran/Iraq Business Prospects Conference in Tehran