Santos Ltd. will withdraw its interest in Bonaparte Gulf permit WA-488-P containing the Beehive prospect following the expiry of the company’s option to acquire an 80% interest from Melbana Energy Ltd.
Santos has been unable to attract a third party to farm into a portion of its 80% to defray the risks of drilling before the Mar. 4 deadline. The company’s interest came in return for an agreement to fund the drilling of Beehive-1.
The permit will now revert to Melbana with 100% interest.
Melbana is holding discussions with potential new partners to join in drilling the wildcat. If new partners are found, the company intends to seek an extension to its obligation to drill an exploration well by December to align with expected rig availability in 2021.
Melbana has also commenced a reassessment of the prospective resources in the Beehive prospect along with interpretation of other possible plays in the permit area based on 3D seismic data acquired by Santos and Total in 2018.
Beehive lies between ENI’s producing Blacktip gas field and the undeveloped Turtle and Barnett oil discoveries in 40 m of water and close to Ichthys gas pipeline to Darwin.
With an aerial extent of 180 sq km, the prospect is one of the largest undrilled hydrocarbon prospects in Australia. It is an isolated carbonate build-up of Carboniferous age with 400 m of mapped vertical relief and a crest at 4,100 m subsea analogous to Tenzig field in the Caspian Sea.
An independent analysis in 2018 estimated Beehive to have a prospective resource of 388 MMboe.
