I agree that Dingo is a low-risk asset on the basis of booked...

I agree that Dingo is a low-risk asset on the basis of booked reserves, pre-drilled holes, and a confirmed gas contract. But a lot of risk is added when you consider CTP has to purchase it first with borrowed money and then develop it 100% themselves. I am sure it's been taken into due consideration, but to call Dingo the "lowest risk asset CTP is ever likely to see" seems a bit much. I'll come back to this point.

CTP needs cash now, and has a lot to pay back before Dingo and Palm Valley break even. Assuming nothing major goes wrong, this could take years (hence my question if anyone could guess at how long). But CTP needs money in the short term to pay for its total JV exploration activities.

Surprise is 100% owned by CTP. And it is already producing. Yes production rates are a cause for some concern, but there are many potential explanations for that and more appraisal is definitely needed. In terms of the lowest risk asset CTP is ever likely to see, what risk is there in bringing in a JV partner to PL6 and having them commit money to drill exploration and appraisal wells? Cash from new oilflow is practically instantaneous due to existing infrastructure. CTP can't wait X years for Dingo to start balancing their finance sheets, they need money now. And to do that they need to leverage on their existing assets. They need oil in PL6. There's a lot of potential upside in that production license.

If CTP is still looking into ways to develop Surprise/PL6, you certainly hear nothing about it. It's another one of those one-liners that went away. But Dingo is the one-liner that has become an essay, and honestly I can't see any reason why anyone should be even remotely excited by it.

p.s. psi81 thanks for the clarification relating to 1P vs 2P reserves. That explains the differences in 1996 reserves from 2013 reserves far better than my guess that they were booking only 1P. Of course it wasn't 1P as it's not under production! It's been a while since I opened up a reserves report, I'm a geo so used to dealing with resources most of the time.