Deltic Energy PLC (AIM:DELT) has confirmed the formal award of UKCS Licence P2672, located immediately west of the West Sole gas field.
The licence includes the Pharos and Teviot discoveries and the newly added area is seen as an extension of an existing Deltic exploration project.
The company's evaluation suggests that the Pharos discovery and the Blackadder prospect form a single Leman Sandstone structure.
Preliminary volumetrics for the Blackadder/Pharos discovery estimate a P50 resource of 165 billion cubic feet (BCF), while Teviot is estimated at 17 BCF.
An initial Phase A work program will focus on reprocessing legacy 3D seismic data to improve reservoir imaging and further de-risk the Blackadder structure. This work is expected to be completed at a nominal cost, according to Deltic.
"The Blackadder project has many analogous attributes to the Selene prospect, where the reworking of legacy datasets has unearthed a potential missed pay opportunity of material scale,” Deltic chief executive Graham Swindells said in a statement.
“Blackadder's location, in close proximity to existing infrastructure that requires new third party gas to defer decommissioning, should enhance its value in a mature basin where new licences are likely to become increasingly scarce.
“Over the coming year we will progress our work on the legacy data in preparation for farm-out, in anticipation of drilling an appraisal well on Blackadder in due course."
The licence was awarded in the third tranche of the UK's 33rd Offshore Licensing Round.