Bangladesh has some oil reserves near Haripur in the eastern hilly district of Sylhet, but these have yet to be developed. The Haripur reserves are estimated at 40 Mbbl, and the total resource is likely to be much higher..
The search of oil and gas in the area constituting Bangladesh began in the later part of the 19th century through some isolated geological mapping. The first serious attempt to find oil and gas was undertaken in Sitakund in 1908 by the Indian Petroleum Prospecting Company. During 1923-31 Burmah Oil Company (BOC) drilled two shallow wells in Patharia. The wells were abandoned though there was a reported occurrence of oil. A total of 6 exploratory wells were drilled, the deepest being 1047 meters. There was however no discovery and the Second World War disrupted further activity.
After the liberation of Bangladesh, Bangladesh Oil, Gas and Mineral Corporation (Petrobangla) was formed, while the Bangladesh Petroleum Act was enacted in 1974. The offshore area of Bangladesh was divided in to 6 blocks, which were taken up by Ashland, ARCO, BODC (Japex), Union Oil, Canadian Superior Oil and Ina Naftaplin under production sharing contract. These companies 7 offshore wells resulted in the discovery of Kutubdia offshore gas field.
According to the 2008 BP Statistical Energy Survey, Bangladesh had 2007 proved natural gas reserves of 0.39 trillion cubic metres, 0.21% of the world total, and 2007 natural gas production of 16.27 billion cubic metres, 0.55% of the world total.
The 1980s saw accelerated exploration activities by Petrobangla, which drilled 12 exploration wells and discovered 7 gas fields. Among these the Fenchuganj well remains the deepest drilled well in Bangladesh (4977m). Meanwhile a new milestone was achieved when Petrobangla discovered the first commercial oil pool in Sylhet on December 23, 1986.
Since 1972 more than 32 exploratory wells have been drilled by the national and international companies which resulted in the discovery of 13 gas fields. Since the first exploration well was drilled in 1908 a total of 128 wells were drilled in Bangladesh until 2001, of which 63 are exploration wells. Of the exploration wells, 13 are in the offshore resulting in two discoveries and the rest 52 are on shore with 20 discoveries.
In 1993, following the formation of a new National Energy policy, the government of Bangladesh divided its territory and offshore sites into 23 blocks and opened them to foreign bidding for oil and gas exploration. Eight blocks were awarded to four companies during the First Bidding Round in 1993, and four additional blocks were awarded in the 1997 Second Bidding Round.
