Core recovery from Llangeinor-1 was excellent, showing the main coal measures were encountered from a depth of 570m, though other potentially interesting coal seams were intersected higher up in the hole.

The 18 seams - the thickest were 3m and 4m respectively - were tested for gas content and selected samples also tested for gas composition by Ticora Geosciences.

"Preliminary results show the total in-situ gas content slowly decreasing with depth from a high of about 11.4 cubic metres per tonne at 534m to 8.4 cubic metres per tonne in the deepest seam tested," Eden said in a statement.

Eden added the third well, Pencoed-1 on the eastern side of PEDL 100, is expected to be spud soon.

The area is considered very prospective for the development of a conventional CSM field due to a large area of relatively flat open fields and good coal thicknesses at appropriate depths.

Eden had said last year it believed it had made a commercial CSM find after its first well, Aberavon-1 in Port Talbot, south Wales, encountered gas content close to typical Australian pipeline specifications for natural gas with permeability results that were equal to, or better than, similar areas in Australia.

This was despite its interpretation that the well had only intersected about half of the coal measures due to substantial drilling problems caused by poor ground conditions that prevented the well from continuing to the base of the coal measures sequence where thicker and gassier seams were expected.