Abu Dhabi’s Supreme Petroleum Council (SPC) has rejected a proposal by Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) to extend the emirate’s existing onshore oil concession by a year, Dow Jones reported industry officials as saying.

State-owned oil company Adnoc now has to make a decision on the joint ownership of its onshore oil fields in advance of the current concession – Abu Dhabi Company for Onshore Oil Operations (Adco) – expiring in early January 2014.

The onshore fields account for more than half of the emirate’s crude production capacity of about 2.6 million barrels a day (b/d).

It was reported in March that up to 10 prequalified international oil companies (IOCs) have been invited to bid for a stake in a new joint venture.  

Adco, a joint venture of Adnoc, the UK’s BP, the US’ ExxonMobil, the UK/Dutch Shell Group, France’s Total and Portugal’s Partex, was formed in 1978 to operate Abu Dhabi’s onshore fields under a 35-year concession.

All existing stakeholders have prequalified to bid for the new concession with the exception of Partex.