By Melissa Maynard

Copyright trinidadexpress

Despite a three-month extension, Trinidad and Tobago’s 2025 Deepwater Competitive Bidding Round attracted only four bids for four of the 26 blocks on offer.

The round included 13 blocks carried over from the 2021 bidding round, which also struggled to attract investors that year.

Still, Minister in the Ministry of Energy and Energy Industries Ernesto Kesar described the bid rounds as a success.

The 2025 round, which officially closed yesterday, yielded results that Kesar said he was pleased and encouraged by.

He made the remarks to members of the media during the closing ceremony at the ministry’s office in Port of Spain.

The bidding process, which started on January 27 this year, was originally scheduled to close on July 2; however, the deadline for submissions was extended by nearly three months. For this round, 26 offshore blocks were made available, including 13 that had been offered in the 2021 round.

This 2025 round included all currently available deep water blocks. The ultradeep area (Blocks TTDAA 17, 18,19, 20, 21, 22 and 23), collectively known as TTUD-1, were not included in the round as negotiations with ExxonMobil commenced in 2024, prior to the launch of the bidding round on January 27, 2025. The Production Sharing Contract for Block TTUD1 was executed with ExxonMobil on August 12, 2025, the Energy Ministry stated yesterday.

Newcomers to T&T’s hydrocarbon markets, China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), bid on three of the four blocks, TTDAA24, TTDAA25 and TTDAA30, while Nigerian company STIT Energy Ltd and Groundports Consortium bid for TTDAA5.

Moreover, CNOOC’s bid on block TTDAA 25 was brought forward from 2021.

Kesar said CNOOC is a global energy company with a focus on major global deep-water projects.

STIT Energy Ltd is a fully indigenous Nigerian oil and gas service company and has partnered with Groundports Ltd an active private company Ltd.

“I thank you for your submissions and extend best wishes for a favourable outcome,” Kesar said.

He disclosed that it is the first time seeing both companies “in their current form. I am informed that CNOOC were doing some work in a local company, through one of their subsidiaries but other than that they are fairly new to our hydrocarbon environment.”

Kesar said the bid round was a success “because you had one company bid for three blocks and another company for one, so again, I am very encouraged. Now there is a new administration led by Kamla Persad-Bissessar and because of that we are going to do some reviews and to encourage in the next bid round to see what we can do to even further encourage more companies.

He assured the bidders of a “speedy review of your bids” with results in three months’ time.

Admitting that this is his first involvement in an upstream bid round, Kesar stressed that the results were not unexpected.

“We are in the market in which we are competing for investments among a limited (number) of players. As a Government we have signalled that we will reviewing fiscal incentives to make Trinidad and Tobago a more attractive hydrocarbon province. This will be undertaken as a matter of urgency,” he explained.

“The successful bidder shall be issued a production sharing contract for a period not exceeding ten years initially, in respect of the block, but upon the achievement of a commercial discovery, it may be renewed, as to a part only of the contract area, for a term of 25 years from the effective date of the production sharing contract,” Kesar explained.

Minister of Energy Dr Roodal Moonilal, who was not at the event yesterday, stated in a news release that “upon taking office, this Government clearly understood the importance of restoring investor confidence by encouraging further investment. I would like to express my gratitude to CNOOC International Ltd, along with the consortium of STIT Energy Limited and Groundsports Ltd for their demonstrated interest through their proposals. I look forward to the announcement of the outcome of the bid evaluation process within the next three months.”

China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) is a state-owned energy giant founded in 1982 and headquartered in Beijing. It is China’s largest producer of offshore oil and gas, with operations in the Bohai Sea, South and East China Seas, and onshore unconventional gas. Beyond exploration and production, CNOOC is active in refining, petrochemicals, power generation and offshore wind.