Mubadala Energy makes gas discovery offshore Indonesia

Mubadala Energy, the wholly-owned subsidiary of Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Investment Company, has discovered a significant deep-sea gas reserve in Indonesia’s South Andaman Block.

The discovery at the Layaran-1 exploration well, located 100 km off northern Sumatra, has more than 6 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of gas, or about 170 billion cubic metres.

The well, drilled to a depth of 4,208 m in 1,207 m water depth, produced more than 30 million standard cubic feet per day (mmscf/d) of gas.

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Mubadala Energy holds 80 percent of the working interest, being the largest net acreage holder in South Andaman.

“With our strategy to expand our gas portfolio to support the energy transition, this development offers material commercial opportunities,” said Mansoor Mohamed Al Hamed, Mubadala Energy’s CEO.

This newly confirmed discovery is the second consecutive successful well for Mubadala Energy in the Andaman area, after the success of Timpan-1 in Andaman-II.  

Given the size of the structure and a single well drilled to date, the UK-based research firm Wood Mackenzie estimated an initial 3.3 trillion cubic feet of recoverable resources, equivalent to more than 580 million barrels of oil equivalent, making Layaran the second largest deepwater discovery globally in 2023. 

In November, Mubadala Energy and Chevron New Energies International signed a cooperation agreement with Pertamina Geothermal Energy to explore geothermal potential in Indonesia.

The two companies also signed an agreement in July to explore carbon capture initiatives in Indonesia.