History

Pantheon Resources was listed in 2006 as an independent UK based oil and gas exploration company focused on hydrocarbon producing basins located onshore USA – a region of low sovereign risk, abundant infrastructure and established oil and gas markets. The Company was admitted to the AIM segment of the London Stock Exchange on 5 April 2006.

In 2019, the Group acquired 100% of the oil assets of Great Bear Petroleum, a private company which had spent over a decade building a significant portfolio of high quality, high potential properties on the Alaska North Slope, which Pantheon strongly believed offered enormous size and scale in a world class setting. Over $200 million had been invested in the project at that time, providing a comprehensive understanding of the subsurface through a proprietary dataset. This figure is over $350 million in investment to date.

Pantheon now has a host of discovered resources that it has continued to mature as the Company has transitioned from what was an early stage speculative exploration company, into an appraisal company with an intention of becoming a development and production company after FID is reached on its Ahpun project which is targeted for late 2025. Over the years, Pantheon has used its proprietary data set to carefully and strategically build and optimise its acreage position across the ANS where it now owns 100% working interest across 193,000 contiguous acres covering the Kodiak and Ahpun projects and is the Operator. An additional 60,000 acres are to be formally awarded in summer 2024. 

Drilling and testing commenced in October 2022 in the Ahpun field via the Alkaid-2 vertical pilot well and the 5,000 ft lateral leg was production tested and confirmed the commercial potential of the Ahpun oil field. Independent Expert Reports estimate a contingent resource estimate of some 360 million barrels of recoverable marketable liquids at Ahpun. The Alkaid-2 flow test was Pantheon’s first long term production and like many first wells in new play types, there was a lot of learning. Alkaid-2 demonstrated the productive potential of the reservoir with Initial Production during its first 30 days (IP30) of over 500 barrels per day of marketable liquid hydrocarbons (oil, condensate and NGL) with an Estimate of Ultimate Recovery (EUR) of 260,000 barrels. 

After extensive analysis of the Alkaid-2 results, Pantheon believed that future wells that are better positioned with optimised completion techniques, in particular improved frac design, have the potential to increase EUR. 

As a result, in October 2023, Pantheon conducted a re-entry and flow test at Alkaid-2. The Company had three clear objectives going into this programme: (i) To assess the efficacy of the revised frac design; (ii) To gather representative fluid samples for pressure-volume temperature analysis (“PVT”), and; (iii) To better determine the initial reservoir pressure. 

All three objectives were successfully completed. The Company’s preliminary estimate of the efficiency of this revised frac was 50% of theoretical design performance and compares favourably with the calculated frac efficiency of c. 20% experienced in the Alkaid-2 operations in the deeper ZOI accumulation carried out in 2022. This efficiently executed new frac design has validated Pantheon’s confidence in the commerciality of the project. GeoMark carried out PVT analysis of fluid samples gathered during the test, which resulted in a calculated GOR (gas oil ratio) for the Ahpun topset of 1,012 scf/bbl, materially less than the calculated 2,000-3,000 previously reported for the Alkaid ZOI. GeoMark also reported 35o API oil with a liquids yield of 162 bbls*/mmcf, compared to 42o API oil with 98 bbls*/mmcf produced from the Alkaid ZOI, meaning a much richer stream. Pressure transient analysis following the retrieval of the downhole pressure gauge indicates greatly improved reservoir quality compared to the Alkaid ZOI. The calculated effective permeability of the Ahpun topset is estimated to be at least two orders of magnitude (i.e. 100x) better. 

*C5+ Liquids 

Following incorporation of results of GeoMark analysis, the flow rate during the Alkaid-2 recompletion in the Ahpun topset was calculated to be 50-140 barrels per day (“bpd”) of marketable liquids, 20-40 bpd higher than the originally announced flow rate of separator liquids (oil) and without including propane and butane that can also be exported through the TAPS main oil line.