MOSCOW (MRC) -- Tethys Petroleum Limited, following on from the recently announced Kazakh State Reserves Committee ("GKZ") approval, today confirmed that it has received approval from the Ministry of Oil & Gas of the Republic of Kazakhstan ("MOG") for the extension its Kyzyloi Production Contract for a further 15 years to June 2029, said The Wall Street Journal.
The Contract Area currently covers some 287 km(2) (70,918 acres), and the Company is currently producing gas from the shallow Kyzyloi sandstone in this area. This Contract extension will give Tethys significantly more time to produce natural gas from this attractive area.
The reserves attributed to the Kyzyloi Contract area, determined in accordance with National Instrument 51-101 of the Canadian Securities Administrators, are included in the Company's reserves evaluation for its oil and gas interests in Kazakhstan set out in its Annual Information Form dated March 31, 2014.
Tethys is focused on oil and gas exploration and production activities in Central Asia and the Caspian Region with activities currently in the Republics of Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Georgia. This highly prolific oil and gas area is rapidly developing and Tethys believes that significant potential exists in both exploration and in discovered deposits.
As MRC wrote before, Kazakhstan plans to build a major petrochemical complex by 2016 to produce higher-value products from associated petroleum gas that is currently mainly flared, according to an official at state-run KazMunaiGaz. The government aims to go ahead with the USD6.3 bln project in order to increase utilization of associated petroleum gas as it believes the situation with gas flaring in the country is "unacceptable," as per Raushan Sarmurzina, executive secretary of the Council on Science and Technology at KazMunaiGaz.
MRC