On Monday, the company announced it had completed financing for its 100% acquisition of the field with a A$7 million debt facility from Bank of Scotland subsidiary BOS International. It will pay Mogal Marine Ltd a total of A$10 million and A$2 million Nexus shares for the field.

The seismic program about to be undertaken is intended to provide high-resolution data that will refine the Crux field development plan.

Nexus also said that detailed interpretation of the new data would help to find the best placement of appraisal and development wells.

In the first half of next year, Nexus plans to drill a single appraisal well to confirm the extent of the hydrocarbon accumulation discovered by the Crux-1 well in 2001. This well will be suspended for future use as a production well, managing director Ian Tchacos said.

The Crux field, in the Timor Sea, about 600km north of Broome, contains an estimated 48 million barrels of recoverable condensate and 1.3 trillion cubic feet of gas. It will most likely be developed as a conventional gas-liquids recycle project, Nexus said.

Independent resource estimates have valued the Crux field, using the Nexus development scheme, between A$280 million and A$640 million.

Discovered in 2001, the field has a 240-metre gross condensate-rich gas column in high quality sandstone reservoirs, according to Nexus.