somebody wants!!, page-18

chrisites pipeline - probably not Although a pipeline from Christies would be nice, it's got a couple of issues.

The first one is that the field isnt that big.

Taking their current estimate of 1.3 mmbl, at maximum production of 300 bopd at 300 days a year, it lasts about a year and a bit.

Given that pipes cost $50k an inch-mile, and it's a fair distance to the nearest Santos facility, I'd say the economics are marginal.

The second issue is that Santos will want some of the profit from the pipeline - if the JV partners are saving $6/bbl on trucking, I'd say Santos would want about $3 of that.

Yep, thats bastardry, but thats Santos for you.

Now, if Christies is a bigger, stratigraphically trapped structure (ie the oil pool is bigger than the area enclosed by the 'bump' in the geology that is the Christies structure), then different story.

If there are other structures near Chrsities that are full of oil, then different story.

But I think they'll just keep on trucking. After all, no-one ever wrecked an oil field by cranking back production, but plenty of people have done reseviour damage by running a field too hard.

Ian Whitchurch