The Christchurch-based Press newspaper today quoted Greymouth managing director Mark Dunphy as saying his company had bid for four contiguous blocks, as required by the Crown Minerals bidding process.
Dunphy said he hoped Crown Minerals would give New Zealand companies that had bid for GSB acreage a “fair go” when evaluating the bids received.
The paper also reported Dunphy as saying Greymouth had the necessary operational and financial capabilities to explore the GSB, often likened to the North Sea.
Dunphy said Greymouth probably had a better success record over the past three years than any other company operating in New Zealand, with last year’s onshore Taranaki Turangi gas-condensate discovery.
Its producing fields – Turangi, Kaimiro, Ngatoro and Goldie – are all onshore Taranaki, though it does have some near-shore exploration permits in northern Taranaki.
Last week it started testing its possibly commercial Moturoa oil find at Port Taranaki, New Plymouth.
Crown Minerals closed bids for the GSB petroleum exploration permits, each of about 9000 square kilometres, early this month.
The government has given no indication of the number of bids received or the explorers involved, although Associate Energy Minister Harry Duynhoven has said the number and variety of bids included “substantial interest” from international companies.
The Petroleum Exploration and Production Association of New Zealand has said it knows of five or six majors that were doing due diligence and preparing bids for the GSB.
ExxonMobil, which bought extensive seismic data over part of the GSB, and Royal Dutch Shell are believed to be among the likely bidders, along with ConocoPhillips, ENI, Petronas and other majors.
Eight wells were drilled in the GSB between 1976 and 1984, mostly by US company Hunt Petroleum.
Kawau-1A was classed as a gas discovery, with proven reserves of 500 billion cubic feet of gas but was not developed. Tara-1 and Toroa-1 both had strong oil and gas shows but were not tested for technical and other reasons.
