The company said the result was driven by higher gas sales, especially in the US, and increased prices for all products, and lifted the result past the $322.0 million for the previous corresponding period.
Total production for the period of 13.0 million barrels of oil equivalent (mmboe) was steady compared with 13.1 mmboe for the corresponding period of 2002.
Total gas production was a record 53.3 petajoules (PJ), up 4.9% from 50.8 PJ in the previous corresponding period. This off-set lower oil production of 2.6 million barrels for the quarter compared with 3.1 million barrels from the first quarter 2002.
Santos' Managing Director, John Ellice-Flint, said the latest first quarter performance reflected the Company's ongoing success in increasing its gas business from an increasingly wider pool of developed projects.
