The reports, undertaken by Mulready Consulting Services and Holt Campbell and Payton, have determined that four of Central’s permits have the potential to contain 25-50 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of recoverable CSM resources.
If the “low” estimate can be proved, the reserves could underpin a GTL plant with 140,000 barrels per day capacity for 50 years, the report found. It said a 50,000bopd plant would require 9Tcf of reserves.
But world oil prices would need to remain above $US30 per barrel for such a plant to remain viable. Central predicted the GTL would be produced at an operating cost of $US6.50 per barrel.
The analysis – undertaken in EPA 130, 131, EP 93 and PELA 77 – was based on data from 14 wells, 2000km of 2D seismic and analogies with similar coal and similar-aged basins in Australia and other parts of the world, Central said.
The company first flagged the possibility of CSM in the Pedirka Basin last week, after buying three permits totalling 27,000 square kilometres off an Enterprise Energy subsidiary.
It claimed that 7500sq.km of the acreage had the potential to host “significant” CSM prospective resources.
