ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan, Aug. 16 (UPI) -- Turkmenistan for the first time opened up its energy sector to the United States when it invited three U.S. oil companies to the bidding for offshore oil concessions.
Aside from Mudabala of the United Arab Emirates, Turkmenistan chose Chevron, ConocoPhillips and TXOil from Houston as the preferred bidders for two offshore oil concessions in the Caspian Sea, Russian news agency ITAR-Tass reports.
The country is also trying to secure a $4.1 billion loan from China, Turkmenistan's state television reports, citing an order by President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov to launch negotiations with the State Development Bank of China.
Turkmenistan, a former Soviet Republic rich in oil and gas, is eager to win new customers from East and West to diversify its hydrocarbon exports beyond Russia.
It has already opened up to China, whose state oil and gas firm CNPC together with LG and Hyundai Engineering from South Korea and Petrofac Emirates from United Arab Emirates is developing the lucrative South Iolotan gas deposit.
A pipeline that opened last year is linking Central Asia to China and is aimed at feeding the emerging superpower's growing hunger for energy by 2013.
Companies from Malaysia, Canada, Dubai and Germany are already active in the Turkmen offshore oil sector. U.S. companies had so far been unable to win contracts in Turkmenistan.
ConocoPhillips has been successful in winning a concession in the Caspian, but the field is located in and allocated by Kazakhstan.
Turkmenistan used to export most of its hydrocarbons to Russia, but that relationship was strained following a Turkmen pipeline explosion in April 2009 that Ashgabat blamed on Russian energy monopoly Gazprom.
A country that borders Afghanistan and Iran and is notorious for corruption, Turkmenistan owns significant oil and the world's fourth-largest gas reserves, located mostly in the Caspian Sea basin.
The Derweze area in the center of Turkmenistan is also rich in gas, as a story that dates back nearly 40 years indicates.
While drilling, geologists in 1971 accidentally discovered an underground cavern filled with gas. The ground beneath the rig collapsed, exposing a large hole with a diameter of about 230 feet. To avoid poisonous gas discharge, authorities decided to burn it, hoping that the fire would go out within a few days. It has been burning ever since. Locals have named the cavern "The Door to Hell."
