Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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1046. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the commitments his Department has made on work programmes for exploration licences and their extensions (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25694/18]

Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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In making an application for an Exploration Licence; to extend the duration of a phase of an existing Exploration Licence; or to enter a new phase of an existing Exploration Licence the applicant must propose work programme commitments which will progress knowledge of the petroleum prospectivity of the licensed area. Evaluation of such work programme commitments by my Department forms one element of the application consideration process.

Work programme commitments will consist of activities such as the purchase or re-interpretation of existing data, geochemical and bio-stratigraphic studies, site surveys, the acquisition of 2D or 3D seismic data or the drilling of a well. The details of such work programmes are by their nature commercially sensitive.

It should be noted that an application to undertake a seismic survey or to drill a well on an Exploration Licence pursuant to a work programme commitment is subject to a separate consent process.