Rystad12 Mar 2019 10:40
High Expectations
Strong market fundamentals and favourable policy change should see exploration
expenditure in Australia more than double from 2018 levels in the next five years,
reaching an annual spend of US$3.6bn by 2023.
Offshore, 2019–20 should see Equinor drill its long-awaited Stromlo-1 well in
South Australia’s Ceduna Basin: the first well in the Great Australian Bight since
Woodside’s Gnarlyknots 1A in 2003. However, there is strong community opposition
to the project and NOPSEMA is yet to approve the well. Success here would be the
first step to unlocking the Bight’s potential multi-billion boe resource.
2019 could prove transformational for Australia’s fledgling shale industry. The
repeal of a fracking moratorium, in place in the Northern Territory since 2016,
should result in at least four shale wells in the highly prospective McArthur Basin
this year. Before the moratorium, Origin Energy conducted one of the largest
fracture jobs ever undertaken in Australia on their Amungee NW-1H well in the
MacArthur Basin, successfully flowing over 1 MMcfpd on test. This enabled Origin
to book 6.6 Tcf of contingent resources in the play, and also acted as a proof-ofconcept
for the basin, representing the first extended commercial-level gas flow from
shale in the state. Origin now plan to drill and frack two horizontal wells in 2019.
Following the success of its Northern Territory Tanumbirini-1 well in 2014,
where the company reported gas over a 500m (gross) interval, Santos is expected
to drill two horizontal appraisal wells in the McArthur Basin. Success here has the
potential to kick-start a rapid development of the region.
Daniel Levy, Senior E&P Analyst, Rystad Energy
https://assets.geoexpro.com/uploads/f9bbd806-dd06-4a10-923d-886281853915/GEO_ExPro_Favourite_Geoscience_Magazine_Oil_Gas_2019_v16_i1.pdf
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