The Perth-based midcap on Friday said in partnership with PetroleumBRUNEI it had won exploration rights to Block M, which contains 10-50 million barrels of oil and more than several hundred billion cubic feet of gas in resource accumulations.
In return for its 40% stake, Tap has agreed to spend $20 million on exploration and appraising existing discoveries over the next five years.
Tap said Block M was considered “grossly under-explored despite its obvious prospectivity” and contained several trends with strong potential for additional resources even larger than those identified to date.
Covering 3100 square kilometres, Block M is in the Baram Delta, a world scale hydrocarbon province containing billions of barrels of oil and trillions of cubic feet of gas.
Block M contains the Belait field, but is under-explored having not seen any concerted exploration effort for many years.
Discovered in 1914, the Belait field has several wells drilled on it and has produced both oil and gas to the surface but remains under-appraised since Shell refocused its efforts on the huge offshore fields.
Based on existing wells and seismic, Tap said field was estimated to contain contingent resources of between 10-50 million barrels of oil and hundreds of billions of cubic feet of gas in the shallow reservoirs alone.
Under its work program, Tap has agreed to drill at least three wells and acquire additional 2D and 3D seismic in the initial exploration phase.
This work is designed to achieve early appraisal and production of Belait, and exploring the deeper potential targets.
The block is close to oil and gas processing and export facilities, with the Belait field only 30km from the Brunei liquefied natural gas plant.
Tap said the acquisition complemented its business strategy of acquiring “quality petroleum permit interests in proven hydrocarbon provinces in Australia and South East Asia.”
The move follows its entry into the Philippines in July last year.
In other company news, Tap said has agreed to supply $12 million worth of gas under a short-term supply contract to a Western Australian customer.
Without identifying the party, Tap said the 33PJ of gas would be supplied over the next nine months from its share of the John Brookes gas field.
