Timor-Leste offshore petroleum exploration: overview of exploration activity within the Timor-Leste Exclusive Area and Joint Petroleum Development Area*
Rui Soares A , Steve Thompson B and Robert Smillie CA National Petroleum Authority, Dili, Timor-Leste. Email: rui.soares@anp-tl.org
B National Petroleum Authority, Dili, Timor-Leste. Email: SteveThompson@anp-tl.org
C National Petroleum Authority, Dili, Timor-Leste. Email: Robert.Smillie@anp-tl.org
The APPEA Journal 50(2) 744-744 https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ09108
Published: 2010
Abstract
Since the 2006 bidding rounds, exploration activity in both the Timor-Leste Exclusive Offshore Area (TLEA) and Joint Petroleum Development Area (JPDA) has progressed steadily.
Within the JPDA, exploration remains largely focussed in the Jurassic-age Plover and Elang Sandstone formations in the Flamingo Trough-Sahul Syncline region. Over 700 MMbbls of liquids and 4 Tcf of gas have been discovered in this western region of the JPDA, including the 2008 Kitan oil field discovery by Eni, which is currently scheduled for production in 2011.
Recent seismic survey activity within the JPDA by PSC holders Petronas and Oilex has resulted in the combined acquisition of 2,800 square kilometres of new 3D data. These surveys, together with on-going re-evaluation of existing well data by these companies, has helped further refine the knowledge of petroleum systems within the JPDA, in preparation for drilling campaigns scheduled for late 2009 and early 2010.
Within the TLEA, multi-client seismic surveys undertaken in 2005, together with on-shore academic research, indicates that the prospective Mesozoic sequence of the Northern Bonaparte Basin underlies the Timor Trough, greatly enhancing the petroleum prospectivity of this region.
Further detailed 2D and 3D seismic surveys in the TLEA have been recently completed by PSC holders Reliance Exploration and Eni. The first wells to be drilled in this deeper water frontier region are scheduled for 2010.
Keywords: Timor-Leste, offshore, petroleum, exploration, oil and gas seeps, Timor-Trough, JPDA, TLEA, Bonaparte Basin, Greater Sunrise, Asia-Australia continental collision, Plover and Elang sandstone formations, accretionary wedge, prospectivity of onshore Timor, Autoridade Nacional do Petróleo, ANP
Rui Soares graduated from the Australian School of Petroleum at the University of Adelaide in 2006. He started his career as production officer with the TSDA (Timor Sea Designated Authority) early 2007. Rui became the Manager for Production and Development for TSDA in February 2008. With the establishment of the ANP (National Petroleum Authority of Timor-Leste) in July 2008, he is now entrusted to be in charge of the Exploration and Production Directorate for the ANP. |
Steve graduated in geology from Queens University in Belfast, UK, in 1972. Starting his geological career in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, he later joined the UK Institute of Geological Sciences and learned the art of field mapping back in his native Northern Ireland, before moving to IGS’s North Sumatra mapping project between 1978 and 1981. Steve has subsequently worked as an exploration geologist across Asia, with sojourns in Africa and Eastern Europe, studying petroleum systems through geological time from the Pre-Cambrian oil and gas reserves of Eastern Siberia to the Plio-Pleistocene tectonics and oil and gas fields of the Carpathian Mountains in Romania. He was elected to Chartership by the Geological Society of London in 1991. Since 2005 Steve has been living and working in Dili, Timor-Leste, as Exploration Manager for the Timor Sea Designated Authority, and more recently as an advisor to the Authoridade Nacional do Petróleo in Dili. |
Robert Smillie is a geologist with 20 years’ experience working in the Asia-Pacific region. He has worked in the corporate and public sectors in both mineral and petroleum exploration and production. From 2002 to 2005 he was Manager, Exploration and Production, for the New Zealand Ministry of Economic Development where he was involved in the assessment and development of a number of new onshore and offshore petroleum projects, as well as changes to mining and petroleum regulations, and the oversight of the development of new web-based data delivery systems to industry. More recently he was Exploration Manager, Calibre Mining Ltd, overseeing the exploration for copper and gold deposits in Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Australia. He has an MSc in Geology and an MBA from Victoria University, New Zealand. |
