Lebanon has delayed again its first auction of oil and gas exploration licences, without announcing a new date for the process to start. In early September, the auction was delayed from 4 November to 10 December 2013, as the government had failed to vote on decrees required to start the bidding process. The cabinet has failed again to adopt the decree by 2 October 2013, which was the deadline to sign first contracts in March 2014.
Lebanon had short-listed 46 international oil firms for its first oil and natural gas licensing round in its Mediterranean coastal waters and 12 groups were pre-qualified to be right-holder operators, including Chevron, ExxonMobil, Petrobras, Eni, Repsol, Shell, Statoil, Total or Petronas. Another 34 companies are pre-qualified as non-operators. Ten blocks are available for exploration.
Offshore gas reserves in Lebanon have been estimated at more than 25 tcf (over 700 bcm), higher than the gas discovery in Cyprus and Syria combined.