• Wednesday, 16 May, 2012

'Find of a lifetime' in Black Sea: OMV

Pioneering success: OMV says Domino-1 could be Black Sea's first deepwater hit

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By News Wires

 22 February 2012 13:51 GMT

An offshore Black Sea well jointly owned by ExxonMobil and OMV's Romanian arm Petrom has made a potentially significant discovery, according to the Austrian player.

Operated by ExxonMobil on a 50% interest, the Domino-1 well is the first deep water exploration well in Romanian waters and is located in the Neptun Block, 170 kilometres offshore.

OMV said the exploration well encountered 70.7 metres of net gas pay, resulting in a preliminary estimate for the accumulation ranging from 1.5 trillion to 3 trillion cubic feet.

Speaking in Vienna as OMV announced its annual results, chief executive Gerhard Roiss told reporters that if confirmed, the find could be the largest in the company’s history, Reuters reported.

"This is something that happens just once in a manager's lifetime, and today is the day," he said.

OMV officials said they would consult with ExxonMobil on the next steps and production could potentially begin around the end of the decade.

"It is the first successful deepwater well in the entire Black Sea, so this is significant," Roiss added.

"Any production will cost billions and billions of dollars. This is not going to be a cheap development if it proves to be economic, although that is still up for debate."

Carmen Arsene, analyst at UniCredit CAIB Securities Romania, told Reuters while the preliminary find was positive news, it was still "too early to determine whether the Neptun block will ultimately prove to be commercially developable or not".

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