Queensland Formally Awards Acreage to APLNG JV
The Queensland government has formally awarded exploration acreage, ATP2046, to a joint venture comprising Armour Energy and Australia Pacific LNG (APLNG), Armour said July 18.
The government had announced the decision to award the acreage to the joint venture last month. Armour will have a 10% interest in the acreage while APLNG will have 90% interest and be the operator, Armour said. APLNG is a joint venture between Origin, Conoco Philips and Sinopec. It is a large supplier of gas to the east coast domestic market, providing approximately 30% of the total volume of gas sold into the domestic market in 2018, according to Armour.
ATP2046 is an 18km2 coalbed methane (CBM) exploration tenure located 22km south‐west of Chinchilla and adjoins APLNG’s Talinga project. The block was part of the first national tender where gas has been designated to be supplied locally. As a part of the joint venture, both parties will be able to independently market their proportion of produced gas.
“Based on ATP2046’s close proximity to APLNG’s Talinga gas plant, it is anticipated that the gas will have an existing path to market, and Armour is in the process of identifying potential gas customers that satisfy the conditions of the tenures, specifically the classification of a “manufacturer” as set out in the bidding process,” it said.
It is anticipated that first gas from this block will be delivered by mid‐2021.