North Sea junior Independent Oil and Gas Plc (LON:IOG) told investors that UK regulator The Oil and Gas Authority has extended the licence for the Harvey appraisal project until December 20.
It effectively means IOG has the opportunity to commit to a well drilling programme before time runs out on the licence.
IOG says that Harvey has the potential to be the largest gas discovery in the IOG portfolio, and it could significantly enhance the economics of the group’s proposed Southern North Sea business.
Harvey’s gas resource is estimated in the range of 44-290 billion cubic feet, with appraisal needed to confirm and narrow these figures.
The company highlights that a successful well could potentially be tied-back to a nearby pipeline, connected a proposed ‘hub’ development of the Blythe and Vulcan assets.
It also highlighted that it intends to submit a field development plan to the OGA for the smaller Elgood project by mid-2017.
Elgood, located near Blythe, is estimated to host 22bn cubic feet of recoverable gas and could be developed with a single well, tied to the nearby hub.
Mark Routh, IOG chief executive, said: “We appreciate the continued support of the OGA with regards to our Southern North Sea gas portfolio.
“The excellent technical work completed by our team on Harvey has confirmed an exciting gas discovery adjacent to our Blythe and Vulcans hubs and the work on de-risking Elgood has avoided the need for a further appraisal well before development.
“We are making good progress on moving our Southern North Sea developments forward and related funding and will provide more updates in due course."