{"id":85294,"date":"2026-02-01T14:32:50","date_gmt":"2026-02-01T09:02:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=85294"},"modified":"2026-02-01T16:36:05","modified_gmt":"2026-02-01T11:06:05","slug":"open-acreage-licensing-policy-oalp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/open-acreage-licensing-policy-oalp\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP)"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oil India undertook a seismic study of the blocks it was awarded during the ninth round of the Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) to chart a bidding strategy for the tenth round.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>About Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP)<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It was introduced by the Government of India (GoI) as a <\/span><b>part of the Hydrocarbon Exploration and Licensing Policy (\u201cHELP\u201d) <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">on March 30, 2016.<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">HELP replaced the New Exploration and Licensing Policy (NELP) regime, which was in existence for over 18 years.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">OALP is a major reform that <\/span><b>changed how companies<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> can <\/span><b>apply for oil &amp; gas exploration block<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s in India.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Under the OALP, the company has the <\/span><b>option to undertake prospecting for fuels in areas<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> which are <\/span><b>not notified by the GoI.\u00a0<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Prospecting refers to drilling the selected area to check availability of hydrocarbon fuels.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The OLAP gives a company the opportunity to prospect for fuels <\/span><b>in any area where<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the <\/span><b>technical feasibility study indicates<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the <\/span><b>presence of hydrocarbons.\u00a0<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The technical feasibility study is an analysis which indicates the likelihood of availability of hydrocarbons in an area.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Once the feasibility study shows the presence of hydrocarbons,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the <\/span><b>company can proceed with the exploration after obtaining permission from<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the<\/span><b> Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH).\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>If multiple requests for sanction are received<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> for the same area, the DGH will make an <\/span><b>allotment by conducting an auction.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Until the OALP was introduced, exploration for hydrocarbons was allowed only in the case of areas covered by the tenders issued by the GoI.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Under the OALP the <\/span><b>exploration can be made without waiting<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> for an <\/span><b>announcement from the GoI that an area is available for exploration.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The OALP regime also <\/span><b>allows companies access to seismic data<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> at the <\/span><b>National Data Repository (NDR).<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">NDR is an online data library containing:<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Seismic surveys<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Geological maps<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well logs<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Exploration history<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Companies can study the data and propose new blocks<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Source: <\/b><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/business\/Industry\/undertook-seismic-studies-of-blocks-acquired-from-earlier-round-to-chart-bidding-strategy-for-oalp-x-oil-india-chief\/article70574771.ece\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">TH<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) is a major reform that changed how companies can apply for oil &#038; gas exploration blocks in India. Read more about Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP), Latest News<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":85350,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[5077,21,22,23],"class_list":{"0":"post-85294","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"tag-open-acreage-licensing-policy-oalp","9":"tag-prelims-pointers","10":"tag-upsc-current-affairs","11":"tag-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85294","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85294"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85294\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85351,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85294\/revisions\/85351"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/85350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}