Nido Petroleum Philippines Limited (‘Nido), on behalf of the SC 54B Joint Venture, announced that the Shell Philippines Exploration BV (‘SPEX’) farm-in to Nido and Kairiki’s interests in SC 54B was formally approved by the Philippine Department of Energy (‘DOE’) on 25 January 2011.
Approval of the SC 54B Farm-in by the DOE is the last in a number of Conditions Precedent provided under the terms and conditions of the Farm-in Agreement.
Following DOE approval of the Farm-in, Participating Interests in SC 54B are now as follows:
• Nido Petroleum Philippines Ltd (Operator) 33%
• Yilgarn Petroleum Philippines Pty Ltd (Kairiki Energy) 22%
• Shell Philippines Exploration BV 45%
With respect to the Gindara-1 exploration well, SPEX and the SC54B Joint Venture have agreed to substitute the deepwater Noble ‘Phoenix’ drill-ship originally proposed to drill the Gindara-1 well with the ‘Atwood Falcon’ semi-submersible rig(photo) .
The ‘Falcon’ is currently operating for Shell in Malaysia and is expected to mobilize to the Gindara-1 location in a window between mid April and end May 2011, following a short period of planned maintenance in Labuan. This rig drilled two wells for Shell in the Philippines in 2010 and is fully capable to drill the Gindara prospect.
Planning for the Gindara-1 is well advanced. Long lead items (casing/wellhead materials) are expected to be delivered in to Nido’s Batangas shore-base in the next few weeks and the Manila-based drilling team is now fully resourced and operational.
Nido will provide further updates to the market on the progress towards drilling the Gindara-1 exploration well as appropriate.
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Source: Nido, January 31, 2011; Image;Atwd