Europa Oil & Gas (Holdings) Plc – Update on Wressle, North Lincolnshire

Europa Oil & Gas (Holdings) plc / Index: AIM / Epic: EOG / Sector: Oil & Gas

1 August 2018

Europa Oil & Gas (Holdings) plc (‘Europa’ or ‘the Company’)

Update on Wressle, North Lincolnshire

Europa Oil & Gas (Holdings) plc, the UK and Ireland focussed oil and gas exploration, development and production company, notes today’s update from Egdon Resources (‘Egdon’) which advises that its application to North Lincolnshire Council (‘NLC’) to extend planning consent for the Wressle oil field development on PEDL 180 in the East Midlands (‘the Application’) was refused.

Europa notes that the board of Egdon intends to appeal this decision without delay and will begin preparing documentation on receipt of the Committee’s decision notice.

Europa has a 30% working interest in Wressle alongside Egdon (operator, 30%), Union Jack Oil (27.5%), and Humber Oil & Gas Limited (12.5%) (‘the Joint Venture partners’).  Egdon`s full RNS including Notes is reproduced at the end of this release.

Europa's CEO, Hugh Mackay, said: “It is disappointing to note today’s decision by the NLC, particularly when considering that this application had received support from North Lincolnshire County Council’s planning officers.  The board of Egdon has been forthright in its intention to appeal this decision and we will stand by for further updates in due course.

“Bringing Wressle on-stream would augment our current net daily production to approximately 250 bopd and generate a valuable revenue stream for reinvestment across our multi-stage portfolio of licences onshore UK and offshore Ireland.  With this in mind, we remain hopeful of a resolution to the outstanding issues to ensure a satisfactory outcome for all parties.” 

Egdon`s RNS published today is as follows:

Egdon Resources plc (AIM:EDR) advises that its application to extend planning consent for the Wressle site to 1 August 2019 was refused at today’s meeting of the North Lincolnshire Council Planning Committee (“the Committee”). The application had been recommended for approval by North Lincolnshire County Council’s planning officers.

Mark Abbott, Managing Director of Egdon Resources plc, said:

“The decision of the Committee is clearly disappointing given that the application had been recommended for approval by North Lincolnshire Council’s own professional planning officers, that an appeal for a previous refusal of such an application had been successful and that we have recently submitted a new application for the development of the Wressle oil field which we strongly believe comprehensively addresses the reasons for the refusal of the original planning applications and the subsequent appeals. 

“We intend to appeal this decision without delay and will begin preparing documentation on receipt of the Committee’s decision notice.”

Notes to Editors:

Planning history:

On 11 January 2017, North Lincolnshire Council refused planning consent for the original application for the development of the Wressle Oil Field at Lodge Farm, Wressle, North Lincolnshire.

On 7 February 2017, Egdon announced that it would both appeal the decision of 11 January 2017 and in parallel submit a new Planning Application for the Wressle development which would include even more detailed information to address the specific concerns outlined by North Lincolnshire Council in their refusal.

On 11 April 2017, Egdon submitted an appeal against North Lincolnshire Council’s decision to refuse planning consent.

On 28 April 2017, Egdon submitted a new application for the Wressle Development including additional detailed information to address the specific concerns raised by North Lincolnshire Council in its 11 January 2017 decision to refuse the original application for the development of the Wressle Oil Field.

On 19 May 2017, Egdon announced the issue by the Environment Agency of the variation to the Mining Waste Permit for the planned Wressle field development and associated operations.

On 3 July 2017, the new planning application was also refused.  The variation of the existing planning for the site requesting a twelve month extension was also refused at the same meeting.

During November 2017, a planning inquiry was held to consider the two appeals for development approval and the appeal of the variation of the existing planning for the site.  On 5 January 2018, we announced that the Inspector had rejected the appeals by Egdon against the two planning refusals by North Lincolnshire County Council’s Planning Committee.  However, the Planning Inspectorate did uphold Egdon’s appeal against the decision to refuse the application to retain the existing planning for the well site, which is was retained until the 28 April 2018.

A new application to extend the current planning consent was submitted on 13 April 2018 and refused 8 August 2018 and the company announced its intention to appeal the decision

On 5 July we announced the submission to North Lincolnshire Council of a new planning application for the development of the Wressle oil field.

Egdon Resources plc (LSE: EDR) is an established UK-based exploration and production company focused on onshore exploration and production in the hydrocarbon-producing basins of the UK. 

Egdon holds interests in 44 licences in the UK and has an active programme of exploration, appraisal and development within its portfolio of oil and gas assets.  Egdon is an approved operator in the UK. 

Egdon was formed in 1997 and listed on AIM in December 2004.

In accordance with the AIM Rules - Note for Mining and Oil and Gas Companies, the information contained in this announcement has been reviewed and signed off by the Managing Director of Egdon Resources plc Mark Abbott, a Geoscientist with over 26 years' experience.

The information contained within this announcement is deemed by the Company to constitute inside information as stipulated under the Market Abuse Regulations (EU) No. 596/2014 ("MAR"). Upon the publication of this announcement via Regulatory Information Service ("RIS"), this inside information is now considered to be in the public domain.

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For further information please visit www.europaoil.com or contact:

Notes

Europa Oil & Gas (Holdings) plc has a diversified portfolio of multi-stage hydrocarbon assets that includes production, exploration and development interests, in countries that are politically stable, have transparent licensing processes, and offer attractive terms. In 2017 Europa produced 113 boepd. Its highly prospective exploration projects include the Wressle development in the UK (targeting production start-up in 2018 at 500 bopd gross) and six licences offshore Ireland with the potential to host gross mean un-risked prospective resources of 6.2 billion barrels oil equivalent and 2.5 tcf undiscovered GIIP across all six licences.

Qualified Person Review

This release has been reviewed by Hugh Mackay, Chief Executive of Europa, who is a petroleum geologist with 30 years' experience in petroleum exploration and a member of the Petroleum Exploration Society of Great Britain, American Association of Petroleum Geologists and Fellow of the Geological Society. Mr Mackay has consented to the inclusion of the technical information in this release in the form and context in which it appears.