석유ㆍ가스전 개발에서의 양허계약

Abstract

The development of oil and gas which are necessarily required for the existence and economical development of human beings and the strong addiction to those materials will be continuous for the next 200 years, in spite of its restriction by environmental problem and the principle of sustainable development in the international arena. The Korea as the representative nation which has rare resources of oil and gas has to keep the development of those resources in overseas on. In development of oil and gas, there is variety of risks such as political, technical and financial risk which the developer, called International Oil Companies, has to face. To alleviate or avoid those risks, the legal researches have been done by lawyers. All risks should be boiled down to the contract for exploration or development. The character of oil and gas as a product is different from others because those are political, economical and cultural goods. The early contract form for development of oil and gas was ‘concession’. The origin of it was that used between Standard Oil of America and Mexico and in Middle East. Since the movement of permanent sovereignty over natural resources and the reaction to the abuse of concession agreement by IOCs, the trend of development contract shifted from older concession to modern concession, production sharing agreement or service contract with the participation or taking of the host Governments. Therefore,there are three kinds of general forms in oil and gas development; concession,production sharing agreement, service contract. The point to which notice has to be given is that there are so many variations in actual field; in other words, it is difficult to find a homogeneous style of development contract. Among those, the representative forms are concession and production sharing agreement. The substantial issues in old and modern concession are ownership of oil and gas in situ, the minimum exploration commitment, participation of the host Government,sharing of the product, and the effective control of development and operation by the host Government. In this article, the form of concession will be dealt with because this form has the longest history and widely used till now. There is very similar form of development contract in America, Lease. The similarity and difference between two forms and older concession and modern concession will be discussed. Then the legal issues in Korea will be the point because the system is not clear and transparent from the legal view. This research will be theoretically and practically and there will be given many actual contract contents as a practical proof. With legal reform, sovereign right over oil and gas might be exercised more materially in Korea. In order to do this, to set up the goal of development of resources and to research the system for oil and gas development in overseas and reform law on mineral development are absolutely required.