In the year of 2018, the block of territories, where “Integral Petroleum” conducted its explorations was taken by another company. According to Petrosyan, it is unclear why the project was passed on to others, after his company worked there “quite successfully”.
The businessman Vachagan Petrosyan complains that the authorities have not allowed him to finish exploring oil and gas fields in the country.
There are oil and gas deposits in Armenia and it is quite possible to organize their extraction. This statement was made at a press conference at the Sputnik Armenia Multimedia Press Center, by the businessman Vachagan Petrosyan. The founder of the “Integral Petroleum” Company, complains that neither the previous nor the present authorities in the country paid any attention to his project.
Starting from 2013 and up to 2018, his company was searching for oil and gas in Armenia. According to Petrosyan, the company identified 13 sites that are promising as oil or gas fields in the course of the research. In January 2015, the company announced the identification of gas reserves of 15 billion cubic meters, as well as estimated resources up to about 100 billion cubic meters. (As a comparison, Armenia imports 2.3 to 2.5 billion cubic meters of gas annually).
The exploration license of “Integral Petroleum” expired at the end of 2017 and the government has decided not to renew it. The argument of the Government was that the company has not fulfilled its commitments to the agreed volume of geological surveys.
The National Armenian legislation also sets out the conditions, under which oil and gas deposits could be treated as discovered and proved. In the case of natural gas, it is necessary to make a well, that produces at least 30,000 cubic meters of natural gas per day.
In the year of 2018, the block of territories, where “Integral Petroleum” conducted its explorations was taken by another company. According to Petrosyan, it is unclear why the project was passed on to others, after his company worked there “quite successfully”.
“Integral Petroleum” contested this decision of the Government in the Administrative Court, submitting 18 points of objection. During that time, the persons in the executive power has changed in Armenia, but the attitude to oil and natural gas exploration has not changed, the entrepreneur complained.
“Unfortunately, the judge did not pay attention to any of these points. It has to be recognized: both the former and the new authorities do not allow us to lay the foundations of the oil and gas industry in Armenia, which are so important for our country's security”, Petrosyan said.
It should be noted that during the Soviet period, wells with a depth of more than 500 kilometers were drilled out in Armenia. After the collapse of the USSR, private companies were reluctant to conduct such large-scale geological surveys.
In all the years that followed, only two new drilling operations were carried out: one was carried out by the “Armenian-American Mining Company” in the 1990s, and the other was done by Canada's “Team Energy” company, between 2000 and 2010.
Source: https://ru.armeniasputnik.am/economy/20191110/21056217/V-Armenii-est-ne…;