Moving Forwads, step by step12 Jan 2026 09:34
We have a few workstreams and todays RNS confirms all are moving forward.
- Plant should be finished within a week or two and producing helium, so by end of Jan hopefully. The compressor has been the cause of delay for some time, it's now onsite so just engineering work now which is within their control = no more major delays with production.
- Offtake discussions ongoing with multiple parties, so we haven't yet settled on a single partner. Sounds like getting a knockout offtake deal with a single major hasn't been straight forward. I wonder if hydrogen potential is causing uncertainty - if it were a straight Helium play then it's easier to predict production levels and pace of new well development/ramp up. With hydrogen, Helix don't yet know what they should prioritise and what the largest commercial opportunity is. If Helix have to invest more exploring hydrogen, before they can sign a hydrogen partnership deal, this will affect pace of Helium well development (and what they can commit to with a Helium off-taker). Again, we know roughly what the helium potential is or could be, any hydrogen presents huge upside so although we have uncertainty now, it's better to have the possibility of the upside.
- Inez should be completed by 19th Jan, then flow tested and hooked up for production. I'm guessing full Inez results some time in Feb.
- Hydrogen - Bo and the team keep coming back to Hydrogen and we're seeing more discussion and analysis (like the weekend Linkedin article). This is an emerging area (White/Gold Hydrogen). With luck it's there, the Precambrian coring samples will hopefully confirm this, otherwise it's back to plan A with Helium production and well expansion,
- Reserves update - this will be exciting when it lands.
What I'm hoping we'll see:
- First Helium production and offtake news - end of Jan
- Inez flow results (Helium) - Before end of Feb
- Update re Hydrogen potential - by end of Feb? (no idea how long this would take to test the Inez samples)
- A major update confirming what we're prioritising, update on field development (seismic and/or next well location) cash position, whether we're pursuing a Hydrogen partnership and ideally a reserves update (upgrade) - end of Q1
- Ingomar - clearly the priority is Rudyard, but would be good to get a sense of when we'll go back to Ingomar.
We've had some minor delays getting production over the line and it should be big news when it's announced. I'm happy overall, keeping with my prediction of 'no more 20s' by end of Jan.