Rex unit secures stakes in two Norwegian Sea licences

LIME Petroleum, a 90 per cent-owned unit of Catalist-listed Rex International, has clinched stakes in two new offshore licences in the Norwegian Sea, under the country's 2019 Awards in Predefined Areas round.

Lime Petroleum will hold a 20 per cent stake in one licence, PL1061, and a 30 per cent stake in the other, PL1062. Both will have an initial two-year period, involving geological and geophysical analysis, followed by "drill-or-drop" decisions. 

The other partners in the PL1061 licence are the operator Wellesley Petroleum AS at 40 per cent, Edison Norge AS at 20 per cent and ONE-Dyas Norge AS at 20 per cent.

For the PL1062 licence, the other partners are the operator Neptune Energy Norge AS with a 40 per cent interest, and Pandion Energy AS at 30 per cent.  

Both licences are in the Haltenbanken area of the Norwegian Sea, near the Åsgard complex and the Heidrun and Midgard fields, "in line with Lime Petroleum's strategy of participating in exploration near infrastructure", Rex said in its filing. 

Lime Petroleum had studied both licences with Rex's proprietary de-risking technology, and determined that they had "significant exploration potential". 

Måns Lidgren, CEO of Rex International Holding, said in the filing: "The award of these two licences is timely, as they allow LPA to have a continuous pipeline of exploration drilling projects in the short term."

Rex shares closed at S$0.181 on Thursday, down 1.63 per cent.