NGE’s initial public offering raised $17.3 million for its exploration program in Papua New Guinea. More than 50% of the shares offered were taken by local and international institutions with the remainder by local investors, according to managing director Jeremy Towner.
"This capital raising moves NGE field operations in PNG to the next stage to have the appraisal and exploration acreage portfolio tested with well drilling," he said.
Proceeds from the raising will be used to fund a 100km 2D seismic survey in petroleum prospecting licence 267 to delineate prospects for drilling and new leads, as well as drilling a well in the same permit.
The survey - a follow-up to the Yalis seismic survey, completed in 2006, which identified two promising leads - aims to complete the geological model for the northern Paradise lead and Panakawa structure, and to upgrade them to drillable status.
This will be followed by the drilling of an exploration well in April or May next year.
NGE said it had been approached by large companies interested in farming into its acreage and will prepare key field operations and accelerate discussions to select
appropriate partners for future large scale exploration programs.
The company engaged Houston-based energy advisory company Moyes & Co to advise in selecting and negotiating with potential farm-in partners for PPL 269 where NGE plans to appraise the Tarim-1 discovery well.
Tarim-1 was drilled in 1990 to test the Tarim surface anticline and had flowed 14,000 cubic feet of gas per day during a drill stem test of the Toro interval, which was interpreted to contain 5.6m of net pay.
The planned drill stem test of the Alene Member (9.6m of net pay) was abandoned when the tools became stuck after the Toro test.
Tarim has estimated in-place reserves of about 41 million barrels of oil and between 97-148 billion cubic feet of gas.
Towner said the company's technical team has also mapped six drillable prospects and 53 leads with an average size of over 60 million barrels of oil equivalent of in-place petroleum resource potential, giving the company a long future for exploration and potential discovery and development.
The company spent two-and-a-half years piecing together 52,000 square kilometres in six onshore licences - PPLs 265 to 269 and PPL 277 further to the east.
NGE's earlier $A50 million ($US43 million) initial public offering on the Australian Securities Exchange was cancelled when its cornerstone investors failed to secure the necessary funds before the offer closed.
