Providence boosts interest in Porcupine Basin licence

Providence Resources PLc, the Irish based oil and gas exploration company, has agreed to acquire Atlantic Petroleum’s stake in Frontier Exploration Licence (FEL) 3/04, which lies in c. 1,500 metre water depth in the southern Porcupine Basin and is c. 170 km off the south west coast of Ireland.

Namely, Providence agreed to acquire, for a nominal consideration, Atlantic Petroleum’s 4.0% stake in FEL 3/04, by which the company’s equity in FEL 3/04 will increase from 16% to 20%, subject to Ministerial approval.

The current principal prospect within FEL 3/04 is the interpreted Lower Cretaceous Dunquin South carbonate prospect (1.389 BBOE REC Pmean).

The company said that the ExxonMobil-operated 44/23-1 Dunquin North exploration well, which was drilled in FEL 3/04 during 2013, encountered a c. 44 metre residual oil column in a massive porous over-pressured Lower Cretaceous carbonate reservoir.

Tony O’Reilly, CEO of Providence said: “We have availed of this opportunity to increase our equity interest in FEL 3/04, which contains the material Dunquin South exploration prospect. The 44/23-1 well results have de-risked many of the elements of the petroleum system and we therefore believe that, on a risked basis, Dunquin South is an attractive exploration prospect.”

“Increasing our equity in FEL 3/04 also reflects our continued corporate commitment and strategic exploration focus on the vast and under-explored deep-water southern Porcupine Basin, which we believe contains all of the elements required to host giant hydrocarbon accumulations.“

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