Will Sri Lanka possess several petroleum and gas fields after 2018?

May, 20, 2015

Sri Lanka is set to possess maritime borders extending up to 800 kilometres from shore in 2018 and it is believed that there are oil and natural gas deposits within these maritime areas said National Ocean Affairs Committee chairman Chris Tilaka Sri Dharmakeerthi.

During an exclusive interview with www.adaderanabiz.lk he added, Sri Lanka is now in possession of only 200 kilometres of seabed from the island’s coast.

“We surveyed the maritime area that we should own and have handed over the details to the United Nations recently. Due to the selfishness of one of our officials and the handing over of these details being delayed possessing this new maritime zones was delayed till 2018. If the details had been sent on time we could have possessed these zones by 2012.

“However, we have been successful in reducing the delay till 2018 after discussing with the UN. Hence, Sri Lanka will possess a maritime zone of 800 kilometres from shore in 2018,” said Dharmakeerthi while adding that though the visible and invisible resources including the fishery resources within the existing maritime zone are currently Sri Lanka’s, the island would own only the invisible resources within this new zone from 200 to 800 kilometres.

“The fishery resources within this new zone do not belong to Sri Lanka. But if there are oil or gas deposits we could exploit them. We believe that there are oil and gas deposits within this area,” Dharmakeerthi added further.

It is commercially profitable to obtain off-shore petroleum resources if the crude oil prices rise over USD 100 in the world market, he said.

The current price of crude oil in the world market is around USD 65 per barrel. However, petroleum resources are considered a fast depleting resource.