When producing licences expire: should governments stick or twist?

Report summary

Investors in conventional upstream projects are focusing their attention on the lowest risk, fastest return opportunities. And at the top of this list is incremental investment in existing assets. Increasing the ultimate recovery of a producing field by a few percentage points, using existing facilities, is hard to beat for low cost and high return investment. Some of this potential investment is being hindered, because the licences containing the assets are close to expiring. In some countries, producers are automatically allowed to continue producing an asset beyond the initial licence period. But in others, there is no guarantee that the investor will keep the current licence terms or even retain rights to production beyond expiry. Find out how expiries of producing licences can impact investors and projects in different countries.