Petronas Crude Oil Discovery To Add 191 Days To Malaysia's Oil Reserves

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 16 (Bernama) -- Recent crude oil discovery by Petronas will add 191 days to Malaysia's oil reserve based on its average daily output of 523,000 barrels a day between April and September 2010, said MIDF Research.

The new natural gas discovery will add 498 days to Malaysia's reserves based on its average daily output of 964,000 barrels oil equivalent (boe) a day between April and September 2010, it added.

The new findings, while not massive, are no doubt encouraging, said MIDF in its Equity Beat Wednesday.

It said more such discoveries were necessary in order to at least maintain the nation's reserve replacement ratio which stood at 1.1 times.

MIDF said Petronas was giving greater emphasis on local exploration with over 50 exploration wells expected to be drilled offshore Malaysia over the next three years.

Earlier, Petronas announced oil and gas discoveries of approximately 100 million barrels of crude oil and 2.8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas at two wells off the coast of Sarawak.

The discovery increased Malaysia's oil reserves to 5.9 billion barrels and its natural gas to 15.3 billion barrels oil equivalent.

(Source: http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v5/newsbusiness.php?id=564096)