Russia's largest private oil company LUKoil has filed a bid for the Skifskaya oil and gas shelf area located in the Ukrainian part of the Black Sea, Ukrainian Environment and Natural Resources Minister Eduard Stavitsky said on Friday.
Ukraine, unhappy with its dependence on Russian gas, is seeking alternative energy sources, including its own oil and gas production on the Black Sea shelf and shale gas output. In May, Kiev awarded global energy companies Shell and Chevron the development tender for the Yuzovsky shale gas deposit in eastern Ukraine and the Olessky field in the west of the country.
LUKoil will compete with a pool of international companies headed by U.S. ExxonMobil energy giant in the tender for signing a production sharing agreement with Ukraine. The pool also includes Royal Dutch Shell and Petron oil refining firm from the Philippines.
The winners of the tender will be announced within a month, Stavitsky said at a news conference.
LUKoil told Gazeta.ru on-line newspaper that the company was interested in that area but declined to comment on the details.
Western investors are "more preferable for Ukraine than LUKoil" because the country is looking for alternatives to Russian natural gas supplies, Valeriy Borovyk, chairman of New Energy of Ukraine private energy alliance, told Gazeta.ru.
Under the terms of the tender, the winner will have to make a royalty payment of 2.4 billion hryvnas ($300 million) to the Ukrainian government and invest no less than 1.6 billion hryvnas ($200 million) in geological prospecting in the initial phase.
Kiev estimates overall investment volume in the Skifskaya area at $10-12 billion and annual gas production from three to four billion cubic meters.
