Africa-centered independent explorer Afren has received approval from the Kurdish Regional Government for the company’s development plan at the Barda Rash field, which Afren operates with a 60% working interest.
In a company statement released today, Afren says it expects to draw its first oil from the Barda Rash field in August this year. The company paid $588 million for a 60% stake in the field last year, which it estimates cost a mere $0.66 a barrel.
The purchase of the Kurdish fields have boosted the company’s reserves by 650%.
The company also has a 20% stake in the Ain Sifi field in Iraqi Kurdistan, which is operated by Hunt Oil.
Earlier this year the company hit its asset-wide production target of 50,000 bpd, dispelling analysts doubts it could be done by the ambitious independent. Nigerian production is contributing strongly to production growth.
“There will always be naysayers but the wells have come on stream as expected,” Osman Shahenshah, chief executive of Afren, told the Financial Times. “This is starting from nothing, pretty much – a company that had $1m capitalisation and no oil and gas production … Seven years later we’ve got production from three assets of about 50,000 bpd.”
According to the Financial Times, Shahenshah expects production at Barda Rash to hit 15,000 bpd by the end of the year.
