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The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) published the names of the companies it selected to operate three gas blocks in Lake Kivu, in the east of the country, lying close to Rwanda. Earlier, it invited tenders for the same
The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) published the names of the companies it selected to operate three gas blocks in Lake Kivu, in the east of the country, lying close to Rwanda. Earlier, it invited tenders for the same. The selected companies are Symbion Power & Red, for the “Makelele” block, Winds Exploration and Production LLC for Idjwi block and Alfajiri Energy Corporation Lwandjofu block. This was revealed by the Minister of Hydrocarbons, Didier Budimbu, in a press release recently.
The first two companies are headquartered in the United States and the third in Canada. This is the first major step for the DRC. A call for tenders for these three blocks of methane gas was floated at the end of July for 27 oil blocks. A dozen companies had expressed interest in the gas blocks of the Lake Kivu graben, sandwiched between the DRC and Rwanda. The filing of applications for the oil blocks should continue until the end of January.
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On October 12, during the counting of applications for the gas blocks, DRC assured that the process of selection would be transparent, impartial, and competitive to avoid corruption and that environmental norms would be complied with. A section of the citizenry strongly objected to the project, supported by Greenpeace, which cautioned against the project citing catastrophic consequences they could have on biodiversity and the climate. The oil exploration and mining would affect in particular a forest complex rich in peat bogs, Greenpeace pointed out.
