Our Business

We are listed on AIM and are one of the leading onshore oil and gas companies in the UK.

We currently have approximately 160 staff with a track record of delivering resources. We have our own well services division including: 2 work over rigs, 4 hot water flush rigs, 1 hot oil flush rig, and in addition 8 road tanker tractor units . In addition we have part ownership of Larchford the drilling contractor and 50% of a rig Joint Venture with Meehan.

Resource Base

A large part of our resource base is in the form of Coal Bed Methane (CBM). CBM is just like any other form of natural gas. Its extraction involves our teams drilling a well into virgin coal seams and pumping out water. This process lowers the pressure in the immediate area, releasing the gas that is trapped in the coal to flow to the surface.

We have been successfully piloting production from CBM at our Doe Green site near Warrington for several years.

We have licences to extract hydrocarbons across the north of Wales and the north of England covering an area of approximately 1,252km² (approximately 309,400 acres). Additionally we own nine Petroleum Exploration and Development Licences (PEDLs),two methane drainage licences and three offshore blocks under one Seaward Petroleum Production Licence. Our areas of operation are Cheshire, Yorkshire, greater Manchester, Staffordshire and the North Wales coast and we are the operator and sole owner of each of our licences.

Independent analysis by leading reservoir engineers, Senergy, has confirmed that we have an estimated net Contingent Recoverable Resource to 1,811Bcf of gas (2C)

We also have the potential to explore shale. Shale involves extracting gas from rock which contains vast quantities of natural gas. We have identified a significant potential shale resource within our acreage which is estimated (on an unrisked basis) to comprise up to 4.5 trillion cubic feet of gas initially in place. Although we intend to conduct more work to better understand the potential of our shale holding, we have no immediate plans to develop it.

We have made significant progress in our goal of converting resources to reserves and have now drilled or in the process of drilling five wells in the UK with a further three planned before the end of 2012.

Production Base

Our current production is predominantly oil.

We have interests in 25 UK onshore licences in the East Midlands and the Weald Basin and are the appointed operator in 23 of the 25 licence areas. In total, we occupy or own 105 sites with an inventory of 247 wells (of which 85 are currently in operation).

In the East Midlands we have two primary production area centres: Welton and Gainsborough / Beckingham.

The Welton area is made up of five fields and a gathering centre where the produced oil, gas and water are separated. The produced oil is exported to Conoco Immingham via road tanker, gas is used for power generation and produced water is pumped for reinjection.

The Gainsborough / Beckingham area is made up of nine fields and a processing facility. Oil is exported to Conoco Immingham via road tanker, gas is piped to Gainsborough-1 for power generation and produced water is pumped for reinjection.

Our Weald Basin sites cover Stockbridge, Palmers Wood, Bletchingly, Storrington and Horndean. Oil is either exported by road tanker to the BP operated Hamble terminal on the Solent or by road tanker to storage facilities for onward transport by rail to the Esso Fawley refinery.

The produced gas is currently mostly used to generate power for our own consumption, with the option to sell into the UK grid.