Rawson non-executive director Mike McGowan met the junior's new chairman Allister Richardson during a period they were both employed at Oil Search, and he told Energy News that he had been asked to join the company to help guide its new PNG strategy after it was announced earlier this year.

Last week Rawson made its four applications public, and they include two areas around the Stanley gas-condensate field and two frontier licences in the North New Guinea and Cape Vogel basins, the latter one McGowan previously explored during his time with Eaglewood Energy.

McGowan told Energy News that APPL 560, previously PPL 257, was relinquished by Eaglewood at the time the company was sold to Perth-based private oiler Transform Exploration, however it has characteristics that are still tempting for wildcat exploration.

If granted, it is intended to be Rawson's "wow factor", a little magic of frontier exploration.

The block covers some 3500sq.km that has never been drilled.

Eaglewood shot seismic in 2009 over the Buna and Kumasi structures to further investigate the presence of direct hydrocarbon indicators, and had hoped to drill an offshore well by the end of 2016.

"We are excited about it, we really like the look of it, and I am hopeful we will be successful with our applications," McGowan said.

The licence is predominantly in shallow water and contains four seismically-defined structures with the potential to host large gas resources. A number of oil and gas seeps have been mapped in the area, while an Ocean Drilling Project research well encountered thermogenic gas in the area.

Past work suggested a well in the remote location will cost $US50 million.

An independent assessment completed several years ago for a previous owner suggested that there could be a total mean resource of 6.5 trillion cubic feet (P50) in the block, mainly on the Buna anticlinal structure that shows flat spot anomalies on 2D seismic data.

APPL 549 in the North Niugini Basin in East Sepik province is another frontier block, previously held by another Canadian firm, LNG Energy (now Esrey Energy) which let the areas go to focus on PPL 325 to the east.

"There are aspects of it that we are quite interested in, so hence we picked up," McGowan said.

APPL 549 sits between the towns of Vanlmo and Wewak, and has no history of production, although oil seeps were found as early as 1925.

Marienberg-1, drilled to 825m, produced a small amount oil and gas near the Sepik River, proving the existence of a petroleum system.

The seeps with associated thermogenic gas indicate prospectivity for both oil and gas, and the area contains a number of leads and prospects worked up by past explorers and there are several large anticlines with in-place potential for more than 400MMbbl or 600Bcf.

A lack of exploration means the major risk is a lack of reservoir development, although past drilling in the Aitape Sub-basin proved the presence of Miocene Puwani limestone in the area.

Large structurally inverted half grabens such as the Sunda folds of Indonesia have been recognised extending into PNG but have never been tested, although the structural features have the potential to trap gas that has migrated after the uplift and inversion in the Miocene-Pliocene.

There have been just two wells drilled in the north of PNG for more than 20 years, with two dusters drilled by Kina Petroleum and Heritage Oil early this year, but while that might have dulled Heritage's interest, as it recently told Esrey it would not fund planned drilling, geologically the story remains the same and the potential for hydrocarbons has only been dimmed, not discounted.

Rawson's two remaining applications - APPL 550 and APPL 551 - are lower risk plays around Repsol and Horizon Oil's Stanley field.

"In that part of the world there are lots of prospects and leads that obviously warrant drilling," McGowan said.

"Eaglewood drilled Ubuntu and had a discovery, our Nama target was drilled by Horizon and Transform, and Siphon-1 was a duster drilled by New Guinea Energy.

"There have been a few wells drilled in the area, but there are still lots of opportunities.

"Stanley has been delayed in its development, but at some point the existing fields have to get developed, something has to happen, and it is as good a place as any to explore because there is lots of infrastructure and there will soon be infrastructure for oil and gas.

"There has been lots of success in the area in exploration terms, and if this part of the world was the Cooper Basin there would probably be 30 or 40 wells there now, but there is no infrastructure and it is a long way from anywhere and that discourages people."

McGowan is confident that Stanley, which was originally discovered in the 1990s, will be developed, probably as a gas-condensate development in the not to distant future, opening up Elevala-Ketu-Tingu and Ubuntu.

"Given the timing involved in working up our areas, getting partners, shooting seismic and drilling, I think our timing will be pretty good if our applications are taken, and if we have a discovery there will be infrastructure in place," he said.

But that's getting ahead of where the company is now.

Its four applications are with PNG's Department of Petroleum and Energy, and still need to be reviewed and assessed against any competing applications.

The result of the DPE work will result in a recommendation to the government's petroleum advisory board based on funding and work program proposals.

Finally, it will be passed on to the minister for award, and McGowan is hopeful that the first licences will be awarded before the end of the year.

While Rawson's team has a good reputation, however the junior's main worry is its lack of cash in a terrible investment climate at a time when the PNG government has expressed anger at past explorers who failed to do even basic work.

The company has just around $1 million in the bank, some of which will need to be spent on the workover and development of 2006's Udacha-1 wet gas discovery in the Cooper Basin.

Rawson has a 10% interest, and hopes to see cash being generated from mid-2016.

That comes with a low cost, but a second development well could be more taxing.

That doesn't leave a lot for PNG or the company's two Otway Basin permits, which it has so far failed to farm-out, but McGowan believes Rawson has the wherewithal to overcome any obstacles.

The company has until July 2017 to drill a commitment well in the Otway Basin, where it has a four gas prospects with a potential for some 90Bcf.

"With Eaglewood we were a small market cap company, we won the licences, raised the money, did good farm-ins with Talisman, Horizon and Oil Search, got wells drilled, and we shot the offshore seismic at 100% in the Cape Vogel Basin.

"We have been through the cycle before, but as a microcap we generated probably $150 million in farm-in equity, and I am confident we can fund our proposed work programs, and I think we have a reasonable record with the DPE as people who generally try to do that instead of people who have sat on acreage, done nothing and lost it, and we do not plan to be in that category."