Tet
01-26-07, 09:44 AM
By Shawn W Crispin
BANGKOK - If the United Nations, World Bank and Harvard University are to be believed, Cambodia is poised to become a major new global energy exporter, with a fossil-fuel windfall that promises to double the country's current gross domestic product (GDP) and potentially lift millions of Cambodians out of poverty.
US oil giant Chevron has indicated a huge oil-and-gas find off Cambodia's south coast, where it has reportedly hit black in four out of five well tests. Cambodian energy official Te Duong Tara last week estimated that the 6,278-square-kilometer Block A that Chevron is drilling could contain as much as 700 million barrels of oil, or nearly twice the earlier 400-million-barrel estimate.
The World Bank has said that Cambodia's total energy reserves may be as high as 2 billion barrels of oil and 10 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Depending on future world prices, fuel exports could generate annual revenues upwards of US$2 billion, or several times the current combined amount that Cambodia generates in domestic revenues and receives in foreign aid, the bank has said. Meanwhile, Cambodian energy officials indicated this week that they hope to ramp up production as early as 2009, three to seven years earlier than the World Bank projected as feasible.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/IA26Ae01.html
Lot's more at the link.
BANGKOK - If the United Nations, World Bank and Harvard University are to be believed, Cambodia is poised to become a major new global energy exporter, with a fossil-fuel windfall that promises to double the country's current gross domestic product (GDP) and potentially lift millions of Cambodians out of poverty.
US oil giant Chevron has indicated a huge oil-and-gas find off Cambodia's south coast, where it has reportedly hit black in four out of five well tests. Cambodian energy official Te Duong Tara last week estimated that the 6,278-square-kilometer Block A that Chevron is drilling could contain as much as 700 million barrels of oil, or nearly twice the earlier 400-million-barrel estimate.
The World Bank has said that Cambodia's total energy reserves may be as high as 2 billion barrels of oil and 10 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Depending on future world prices, fuel exports could generate annual revenues upwards of US$2 billion, or several times the current combined amount that Cambodia generates in domestic revenues and receives in foreign aid, the bank has said. Meanwhile, Cambodian energy officials indicated this week that they hope to ramp up production as early as 2009, three to seven years earlier than the World Bank projected as feasible.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/IA26Ae01.html
Lot's more at the link.