Australian AWE Commences Gas Sales from Waitsia Project

Australian AWE has started commercial gas sales from stage 1A of the Waitsia gas project in Perth Basin.

The project, AWE said on August 29, was on time and with the approved budget of A$18mn (US$13.6mn). The project is operated by AWE, with 50% interest, and in production licence L1/L2 in the onshore Perth Basin, Western Australia. Stage 1A comprised the installation of new infrastructure to connect the Waitsia-1 and Senecio-3 gas wells to the upgraded Xyris production facility.

The gas is being delivered to the Parmelia pipeline with Alinta Energy taking up to a maximum daily quantity of 9.6 TJ/day under a 2.5 year take or pay gas sales agreement. AWE said it is now focused on moving towards stage 2, a full field development phase that would increase production capacity up to 100 TJ/d.

 Map of AWE's Perth Basin operations (Credit: AWE)

The development concept selection process for Waitsia stage 2 has begun and two new appraisal/production wells are planned to be drilled in calendar year 2017.

Meanwhile, AWE on August 25 reported net loss of A$363mn for the year that ended on June 30, mainly owing to A$242.5mn of non-cash impairments. For the fiscal year 2017, it has guided for a production of 2.7mn and 3mn barrels of oil equivalent, much lower than production of 5mn boe in FY 2016. 

Shardul Sharma