An official announcement of a new international tender to offer exploration and exploitation rights for  blocks off Crete and in the Ionian Sea could be announced withn the current week, energy minister Giorgos Stathakis suggested yesterday.

The minister was responding to a question as to why yesterday’s signing of an agreement between the Greek State and a consortium comprised of ELPE (Hellenic Petroleum), Total and Edison for the rights to offshore Block 2, west of the Ionian island Corfu, did not coincide with an announcement of the new Crete-Ionian Sea tender, as had been anticipated by certain officials.

Bureaucratic procedures in Brussels are believed to have held up the process.

EDEY, the Greek Hydrocarbon Management Company, is already preparing for the announcement with a promotional campaign, already in progress.

Just over a week ago, EDEY’s deputy chief Spyros Bellas attended an AAPG/SEG (American Association of Petroleum Geologists/ Society of Exploration Geophysicists) international conference and exhibition held in London, to head a Greek booth.

It drew considerable attention from investors. Some 25 presentations were made to international oil companies, including Noble Energy, Anadarko Petroleum and Chevron.

Bellas, the EDEY deputy, is scheduled to return to London next week for a private oil industry meeting, held every three months and involving highly-ranked industry authorities. Information is exchanged and new partnership and investment opporunities are explored at these meetings. Next week’s oil scouters session will focus on southern Europe and north Africa.

The imminent Crete-Ionian Sea international tender was prompted as a result of an interest expressed by two consortiums, ELPE-ExxonMobil-Total and Repsol-Energean.

EDEY is aiming to broaden the interest and create conditions that could lead to fiercer bidding for exploration and production licenses.