Korea firm SK Earthon eyes Vietnam crude oil production in 2025

South Korean petroleum exploration firm SK Earthon expects to start crude oil production at the 15-1/05 Block in the Cuu Long basin off southern Vietnam in 2025.

SK Earthon is in the process of securing approval from the Vietnamese government for the development of the 15-1/05 oil field, Myeong Seong, CEO of the company, said in a message published on SK Innovation’s news site on Monday.

However, he did not reveal how much production his firm is targeting.

SK Earthon is a unit of SK Innovation, which is in turn part of SK Group, South Korea’s second-largest chaebol after Samsung Group.

SK Innovation signed a contract with the Vietnamese government for the block’s mining rights in February 2007. The company said in 2019 that it discovered crude oil while exploring the 15-1/05 Block, but the reserves were not disclosed.

In a related development, Vietnam’s second-largest natural gas project that needs around $10 billion to facilitate fuel energy transition has received a stimulus from a deal signed on February 22 by Japanese heavyweight Marubeni and state-run Petrovietnam.

Petrovietnam signed the heads of agreement with Marubeni to provide the latter with gas to run the Marubeni-invested O Mon II thermal power project in the Mekong Delta city of Can Tho. The deal also serves as a basis for Petrovietnam to accelerate its work on the development of the entire Block B gas-power project - Vietnam’s second-biggest natural gas project.

Block B is also off southern Vietnam but located in the Malay-Tho Chu basin, not in the Cuu Long basin like the 15-1/05 Block.