Santos’ quarterly sales up on higher production

Australia’s Santos informed on Friday its first quarter sales volumes jumped 40 percent up to 21.3 mmboe from 15.2 mmboe in the first quarter 2015.

Quarterly production of 15.6 mmboe which was up 11 percent on the corresponding quarter in 2015, the company’s report reveals.

Despite the decrease in the average realised oil price of 20 percent to A$51 (US$37) per barrel the company’s revenue edged up 1 percent from A$825 to A$835.

During the quarter, the capital expenditure was slashed by 59 percent to A$209 million in comparison to the same quarter in 2015.

Santos Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Kevin Gallagher said the company is looking to lift the production further. Santos’ 2016 production guidance remained at 57-63 mmboe.

LNG projects

Santos revealed in its statement that the production at the GLNG train one reached 958,000 tons of LNG, with an annualised rate of approximately 3.8 mtpa.

The project shipped 16 cargoes during the quarter and Santos recently revealed it has already shipped 25 cargoes from the facility since the start up in September 2015.

Sales under the long-term contracts with the project’s foundation customers started at the end of March.

Commissioning of the second train is underway with first gas introduced into the front end of the train in April. All six refrigerant compressors have been run and the wet flare, dry flare and fuel gas systems are operational. First LNG is expected in the second quarter of 2016, Santos said.

Santos that has a 13.5 percent equity interest in the Papua New Guinea LNG project operated by ExxonMobil informed that 26 cargoes were shipped during the first quarter while the ConocoPhillips-operated Darwin LNG plant, where Santos holds an 11.5 percent stake, shipped 14 cargoes during the quarter.

The company added that the average LNG price realised was at US$6.24 per mmBtu.

1 AUD = 0.77 USD

LNG World News Staff