JAKARTA (Aug 26): Indonesia's oil and gas production in the first seven months of this year fell below the government's targets as unplanned shutdowns, gas pipe leaks and natural decline disrupted output, an energy ministry official said on Wednesday.

Oil production over the January-July period was 578,156 barrels per day while gas output was 6,455 million standard cubic feet per day, below the 610,000 bpd and 6,837 mmscfd targets respectively, ministry data showed.

The biggest declines were at Indonesia's two largest oil-producing blocks, Pertamina-operated Rokan and Exxon Mobil's Cepu.

Cepu's output fell to 124,000 bpd from 151,000 bpd last year, while Rokan produced 133,000 bpd against a target of 163,000 bpd and last year's output of 151,000 bpd, data from upstream oil and gas regulator SKK Migas showed.

Leaks in a gas transmission pipeline and a power supply issue contributed to the decline at Rokan, said Laode Sulaeman, director general of oil and gas at the energy ministry.

"Cepu Block is experiencing a rather extreme rate of natural decline ... steps have been taken to try to reduce this," Laode told a parliamentary hearing.

An unplanned and temporary shutdown of one month due to fire at an LNG train of BP-operated Tangguh had affected gas production, SKK Migas chairman Djoko Siswanto told the same hearing, adding that the LNG train has restarted, but operations were yet to return to normal.

State energy firm Pertamina was working on permits to start drilling after its recent oil discovery at Jambi Merang field, deputy chief executive Oki Muraza said.

"We have made a potentially massive discovery, possibly amounting to 1.4 billion barrels. That is a huge figure," he said, adding efforts were underway to secure licences with the aim of drilling several wells that could see a significant increase in production.

Uploaded by Magessan Varatharaja