Placing

29 Nov 2006 07:01

White Nile Limited29 November 2006 White Nile Ltd / Ticker: WNL / Index: AIM / Sector: Oil & Gas 29th November 2006 White Nile Limited ('White Nile' or 'the Company') Raises £12 million and identifies drill rig to advance Southern Sudanese oil assets in Block Ba White Nile Ltd, the AIM traded oil and gas exploration company, has raised £12million through the issue of 12,000,000 new ordinary shares of 0.1p each at£1.00 per share. The proceeds of the placing, conducted with existing as well asnew institutional investors, will be utilised to fund the drilling anddevelopment of the Company's Block Ba oil concession area in Southern Sudan. White Nile is also pleased to announce that it has identified for use a RomanianF200 DH modular drill rig, which will target identified structures on Block Bawhere the productive Muglad Basin extends into the concession area. The Companybelieves these structures are suitable for forming hydrocarbon traps analogousto the producing oilfields of the area of Muglad Basin located to the northwestof Block Ba, which include the Unity, Heglig and Thar Jath oilfields, which haveestimated oil in place figures of circa 600 million, 550 million and one billionbarrels respectively. It is intended that the proposed initial programme, involving the drilling ofthree exploration wells, will be carried out in the dry season with the firstexploration well targeted for the first quarter of 2007. The immediate targetstructures, located in the Jonglei sub-basin of the Muglad Basin in the westernpart of Block Ba, were identified following the interpretation of over 550 km ofhigh-density, 2D seismic data acquired by White Nile over the last year. White Nile will continue its high-density 2D seismic programme in the Pibor PostBasin, part of the productive Melut Basin which extends from Block Ba northwardsand includes the Great Palogue oilfield and the Adar-Yale oilfield. These fieldshave estimated oil in place of circa 2.9 billion barrels and circa 276 millionbarrels respectively. The programme at Pibor remains on target to commence inearly 2007. White Nile Chairman Phil Edmonds said, "Following the seismic interpretation, webelieve we have a new understanding of the prospective nature of the Jongleisub-basin of the Muglad Basin. The funding means that we can drill explorationwells on our identified targets, the first of which is a 50 sq km structure. Wehave identified a rig, which will enable us to start drilling in the firstquarter of 2007 during the dry season, in order to advance our explorationprogramme, aimed at proving the extent of the reserve potential in the MugladBasin area of Block Ba. We are also expanding our exploration activities in theMelut Basin area which we again believe has the potential to house significantoil bearing structures." Application will be made today for the new shares to trade on AIM and it isexpected that dealings in these shares will commence on 4th December 2006. Thenew ordinary shares will rank pari passu in all respects with the existingshares in issue. * * E N D S * * Contacts: Phil Edmonds White Nile Ltd Tel: 0845 108 6060 Hugo de Salis St Brides Media & Finance Ltd Tel: 020 7242 4477 Jonathan Wright Seymour Pierce Ltd Tel: 020 7107 8000 This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange