A rig from Dubai for the drilling operation will reach Chittagong port within a week, company officials told this correspondent on Thursday.

Movement of the rig from Chittagong to the North Pad of Bibiyana will be started in the second week of October.

The company would drill at least six wells there. German company Deutag has already been contracted for the drilling, the officials added.

This will be a major work by Unocal, which will involve 230 million US dollars.

There are two old gas wells in the North Pad of Bibiyana, drilled by another US company Occidental in 1998. Occidental sold its assets to Unocal and left Bangladesh after the blowout in Magurchhara Gas field in Moulvibazar in the early hours of June 15, 1997.

Unocal is hopeful of starting production in Bibiyana gas field by the end of next year. This is considered the richest gas field in the country.

Initially, 200 MMCFD gas would be supplied to the National Gas Grid. By the end of 2008, the company would raise the production to 400 MMCFD, which would be the optimum production there, the official said.

Work on laying of a 47-kilometre pipeline from Bibiyana gas field to the North-South pipeline (National Gas Grid) at Muchhai in Habiganj would also start soon.

The Prime Minister's office last month approved acquisition of 140 acres land in of Habiganj and Moulvibazar districts for laying the pipeline, the sources said.

Keeping the target in view, preparatory work for setting up a 500 MMCFD gas processing plant at the South Pad of Bibiyana gas field has been started, the company officials said.