On 14 December 2017, the Lebanese Petroleum Administration (LPA) announced that the Council of Ministers has approved the awards of two exclusive petroleum licences for the exploration and production in Blocks 4 and 9 to a consortium comprised of Eni, Total and Novatek. The move follows an announcement by the LPA in October, which stated that the three-company consortium was the sole bidder in the country's extended first offshore licensing round. <P />The country restarted its first offshore licensing round in January 2017, following the approval of two crucial decrees related to block delineation, tender protocol and Model Exploration & Production Agreements (EPA). The acreage offered included Blocks 1, 4, 8, 9 and 10, with the latter three partly covering an area that is claimed by Isarel. The 46 companies that were shortlisted in a first prequalification round in 2013 remained eligible to bid. In the 2013 prequalification round, twelve companies pre-qualified to bid as operators and 34 companies pre-qualified to bid as non-operators. In a second prequalification round, which was conducted between 2 February 2017 and 31 March 2017, eight further companies were shortlisted. <P />The bid round had been beset by delays for several years, due to the failure to obtain Cabinet approval, and the lack of the necessary ratification of two decrees. It was officially launched by the Ministry of Energy & Water (MEW) on 2 May 2013. The bid round had originally been scheduled to close on 4 November 2013, but was extended on several occasions.
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