Photo by: Bloomberg
PERTH (miningweekly.com) – ASX-listed Beach Energy has reported declines in production and sales during the quarter ended March, with natural oil field declines and weather delays affecting output.
Beach told shareholders on Tuesday that production for the quarter declined by 11% on the previous quarter, to 2.1-million barrels of oil equivalent. Severe weather conditions delayed the commissioning of the Bauer facility upgrade, in the Cooper basin, with initial contribution from the first Bauer pad well occurring only late in the quarter.
The remaining three pad wells would be brought on line to maintain production at current levels.
Meanwhile, sales volumes during the March quarter were down by 23% quarter-on-quarter, resulting in sales revenue declining by 33%, to A$131-million.
Beach reported that the lower sales volumes were also impacted by seasonally lower gas demand and higher planned downtime at its Moomba gas processing facility, in South Australia. Timing of the liquefied petroleum gas and condensate shipments also contributed to reduced volumes.
Furthermore, the dramatic decrease in revenue was ascribed to a combination of lower realised oil prices and lower sales volumes.
For the full-year, Beach expected production to decline from the previous guidance of between 8.9-million and 9.4-million barrels of oil equivalent, to between 8.9-million and 9.2-million barrels of oil equivalent.