Re- RNS: see full details below2 Feb 2023 09:43
Placing.
Current trading and activity
The Company released its financial results for the half-year ending 30 June 2022 ("H1 2022"), including the events occurring after the period end, on 10 August 2022, and recently the Company released its fourth quarter report on 25 January 2023, and as at 31 December 2022 had cash resources of A$14.1 million.
Project Phoenix (formally Project Icewine East)
The former Icewine East area was renamed Project Phoenix to reflect the Company's refreshed exploration strategy for this acreage. Since its acquisition in 2014, exploration on the acreage targeted the unconventional HRZ (Highly Radioactive Zone shale) play. Project Phoenix is focused on the oil-bearing conventional reservoirs identified during the drilling and logging of Icewine-1 and recently flow tested by Pantheon Resources. Project Phoenix is strategically located on the Dalton Highway with the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System running through the acreage.
During H1 2022 the Company announced that permitting and planning was underway for the Hickory-1 exploration well, located in Project Phoenix on the North Slope of Alaska. Hickory-1 is designed to appraise up to six conventional plays within the SMD, SFS, BFF and KUP reservoirs targeting 647 million barrels of oil. The optimised drilling location was informed by an extensive data suite and intersects and will test the substantial potential oil volumes noted across all mapped play fairways, particularly the SMD, SFS and BFF reservoirs.
Spud of Hickory-1 is scheduled to occur in early March 2023 to a permitted total depth of 12,500 feet. The well has been significantly de-risked by recent Pantheon Resources' drilling and flow tests, interpretation of the Icewine-1 well logs and modern Franklin Bluffs 3D seismic data (FB3D) and associated AVO analysis.
The Company expects the Permit to Drill (PTD) to be approved imminently by the AOGCC for the Hickory-1 exploration well. In addition, construction of the Hickory-1 ice-pad is expected to commence shortly with mobilisation of the Nordic Calista Rig-2 scheduled to begin around mid-February from the Pantheon Resources Alkaid-2 well location. Planning and permitting for the Hickory-1 well is now largely complete with the approval of the PTD, ahead of targeted spud in early March 2023. Hickory-1 Project Manager, Fairweather, LLC, is in the final stages of the tendering and contracting program for the drilling operations, with the final well cost anticipated to be lower than the previously drilled Icewine-1 and 2 wells on the Project Phoenix acreage at around US$13.5 million gross (88E 75% working interest).
Further details of the drilling program will be announced by the Company in the lead-up to planned spud, scheduled for early March 2023.
The Company has received notice from the Alaska Department of Natural Resources (DNR) that a recently submitted unit application covering the Project Phoen