Tap Oil to Pursue Unconventional Resources in Carnarvon Basin

Tap Oil said Monday that it has entered into a binding agreement with Rusa Resources Pty Ltd (Rusa) to participate in the exploration of a significant acreage position in the onshore Carnarvon Basin, Western Australia.

Rusa holds full equity ownership in two special prospecting authority (SPA) applications (STP-SPA-018 and STP-SPA-021) with acreage options. The acreage options allow for the potential to convert up to 50% of the SPA areas into exploration permits, subject to usual government and other approvals. Tap will earn the right to take a 20% interest in the resulting exploration permits on election, with an option to earn an additional 15% in each permit.

These SPAs cover a total combined area of over 38,000 km2 (9.47 million acres), and contain a large part of the Palaeozoic Merlinleigh Sub-basin, the entire Byro Sub-basin, plus associated shelfal areas. The exploration focus is primarily on unconventional plays, with the main targets being Permian shale gas and Devonian shale oil. There is also conventional oil and gas potential.

The acreage position is located in close proximity to the Dampier to Bunbury natural gas pipeline which could provide access to either the growing Western Australian domestic gas market or the LNG export market.