A joint venture of Santos Ltd. and Inpex Corp. has been awarded two exploration permits in the Browse basin offshore Western Australia, about 500 km from Broome.
Both blocks, WA-513-P and WA-514-P, are close to Inpex’s Ichthys field and to Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s Prelude and Concerto gas-condensate fields currently under development. Another find—Lasseter-1 in adjacent WA-274-P—was made by Santos last August.
Water depths in the new permits are 300-400 m.
Santos has 60% interest; Inpex has 40%. Both companies—in particular Inpex, with the Ichthys LNG project nearing completion—are keen to maximize the potential of their earlier discoveries.
