In mid-2026, Inpex will invite bids for the construction of Indonesia's Abadi Liquefied natural gas project.

Inpex, a Japanese oil and natural gas exploration company, said that it would begin the engineering tender for its Abadi project in Indonesia by the middle of this year. Jakarta has pledged to eliminate 'bureaucratic snags' in order to expedite development on the $21 billion project. Abadi, the liquefied gas project (LNG) in Indonesia's Masela Block has been delayed for years due to the request of the previous administration that the plant be moved onshore.

Purbaya Yudhi Satewa, Finance Minister, chaired on Tuesday a meeting to "debottleneck" the project with Inpex, its Abadi partners Pertamina Indonesia and Petronas Malaysia, as well as Indonesian officials.

Jarrad Blinco's Abadi Project Director, Jarrad Blinco said that Inpex has "made some good progress". This includes obtaining approval for an environmental impact study and a permit to use forest land. The company aims at starting the tendering stage for engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC), in the middle this year.

Finance Minister Purbaya stated that the government would help remove obstacles in order to speed up the?permitting process and offered to relax certain requirements, such as local content requirements.

Purbaya stated, "This is also important to us."

Djoko siswanto, the head of Indonesian's upstream regulator SKK Migas told the meeting that construction of basic infrastructure, such as roads, will begin in early April.

The Abadi LNG Project?will require an investment of around $21 billion, which includes?building a LNG plant with a capacity of 9.5 millions metric tons per year.

Blinco stated that Inpex had conducted initial 'talks' with potential buyers but has not yet decided how to split the domestic and international customers.

Djoko stated that SKK Migas is expecting 40% of its output to be sold on the Indonesian domestic market. (Reporting by Fransiska Nangoy; Editing by Kevin Buckland)

(source: Reuters)