Mitsui Executes Galilee Basin Farm-in Agreements with WestSide (Australia)

WestSide Corporation Limited announced that Mitsui E&P Australia Pty Ltd (Mitsui) has today executed farm-in agreements with WestSide to acquire a 49 per cent interest in each of the Company’s Galilee Basin tenements, ATP 974P and ATP 978P.

As previously announced, Mitsui notified WestSide on 1 November 2010 of an intention to exercise its option to farm in to the tenements, subject to negotiation of mutually agreeable farm-in and operating agreements.

WestSide’s Chief Executive Officer Dr Julie Beeby welcomed Mitsui’s execution of the agreements to jointly explore the tenements encompassing 14,480km2 in a prospective area acknowledged as Queensland’s last coal seam gas (CSG) frontier.

“The ownership structure of this new joint venture aligns with our existing Meridan SeamGas joint venture with Mitsui at Moura in Queensland’s Bowen Basin and extends this alliance into the Galilee,” Dr Beeby said.

A settlement payment of $1.6 million, based on reimbursement of 49 per cent of WestSide’s costs to date, is scheduled to occur following Queensland Ministerial approval of the change in tenement interests.

WestSide as Operator expects exploration drilling to commence shortly within the tenements, containing an estimated 21 trillion cubic feet of gas in place.

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Source: WestSide, June 14, 2011;