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Trio secures Newfoundland parcels
Offshore Newfoundland and Labrador has received a strong vote of confidence from a trio of international companies which has committed to spending C$348 million exploring two parcels.
The Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board said Norway’s Statoil, Spain’s Repsol and U.S.-based Chevron made successful bids of C$202 million for one 610,300-acre block in the Flemish Pass/North Central Ridge and C$146 million for a nearby 461,300 acres.
The bids represent the amount of money the companies plan to spend on exploration.
Statoil will operate both blocks with a 50 percent stake; Chevron will hold 40 percent and Repsol 10 percent.
Among other offerings in the call for bids, privately held Ptarmigan Energy secured rights to two parcels, covering a combined 875,000 acres, off Newfoundland’s west coast for C$2 million.
2009 discovery at Mizzen The Flemish Pass license is adjacent to Statoil’s Mizzen discovery that was drilled in 2009, with Husky Energy as a 35 percent partner, although the company has kept a tight lid on information about the well.
It said only that “hydrocarbons were encountered” during deepwater drilling about 300 miles east-northeast of St. John’s, the capital of Newfoundland, and would not indicate whether the find was oil or natural gas.
A company spokesman said it would take at least two years to analyze the data and decide whether to conduct appraisal drilling.
He said that if reserves would support a commercial operation it could take another 10 or 15 years before development and production was possible.
Statoil is already involved in the province’s producing Hibernia and Terra Nova fields and is a partner in the Hebron project that is moving towards production.
The Flemish Pass area has been only lightly explored, but has been rated as a potentially import frontier.
—Gary Park
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