The company yesterday said it had completed appraisal of the Wei 6-12 South and Wei 6-12 oil fields and the report has been submitted to the Chinese Government to “move the field towards commercial development”.

Based on oil-in-place and model-generated recovery, it is estimated the recoverable oil at the fields ranges from 19 million barrels of oil to 27MMbbl.

Roc said the report does not address an additional 10MMbbl of oil estimate for the undrilled Silver and Footwall prospects adjacent to the Wei 6-12 South field.

The Block 22/12 JV is now moving to commercial development via a formal front-end engineering and design phase, due to begin this quarter with a final investment decision expected in the second half.

Roc said subject to receipt of government approvals, availability of contractors and the cost of goods and services, first oil could be in production by 2009.

Chief executive John Doran said the appraisal report “paves the way for a move towards a cornerstone commercial development that could trigger a number of add-on development opportunities”.

“Until now the difficulty with our activities in the Beibu Gulf has been getting the first cab to move off the rank and while we are not quite at that point just yet, we have certainly taken a big step in that direction,” he said.

“If the optimum schedule is maintained, the development of the Beibu fields will dovetail very neatly into Roc’s production and development activities in the Bohai Bay.”

Participants in the Block 22/12 JV are Roc Oil (China) with a 40% stake, Horizon Oil (30%), Petsec Energy (25%) and First Australian Resources subisidiary Oil Australia (5%).