UK Oil & Gas PLC announces that the Oil and Gas Authority ("OGA") has granted two-year extensions to the initial terms of the Company's operated PEDL331 (UKOG 95%, Isle of Wight, Arreton oil discovery) and PEDL143 (UKOG 67.5%, northern Weald, "A24" prospect) licences. The initial terms will now end on 20 July 2023 (PEDL331) and 30 September 2022 (PEDL143), respectively. The Company expects that these extensions will permit its previously reported multiple well appraisal and exploration drilling campaign to be conducted and completed fully within both licences' initial term.

Isle of Wight PEDL331 "Arreton Oil Discovery"

The Isle of Wight PEDL331 Arreton licence is, in the Company's view, one of UKOG's premier appraisal stage assets, which, as per the Company's 2018 Competent Person's Report ("CPR"), contains 14.9 million barrels ("mmbbl") of UKOG net P50 case recoverable Contingent Resources within the Arreton oil discovery, plus a further 10 mmbbl of net recoverable Prospective Resources in the geological look-alike Arreton South and North prospects. Drilling of the Arreton-3/3z appraisal well and extended flow test is now scheduled to commence in Autumn 2020, subject to the grant of necessary regulatory consents. 

As further set out in the Company's 2018 Re-Admission document, the Arreton South and North prospects contain aggregate P50 Portland oil in place of 77.2 mmbbl, more than twice as much as the Company's flagship Horse Hill Portland oil field (UKOG 85.635% interest). Further significant upside in both prospects is calculated to lie within the underlying Inferior Oolite sequence.

UKOG's subsurface team have also recently identified a further large undrilled anticlinal structure, the Arreton East Prospect, another look-alike to the Arreton discovery and lying further to the east along the same geological trend. Initial mapping shows this feature to be many times larger than both the Arreton oil discovery and Arreton South prospect combined. Further work and potential recoverable resources will be reported in due course.

Following completion of Arreton-3/3z, the Company currently plans to proceed directly to drill Arreton South, and if regulatory permissions are in place, to proceed directly to drill Arreton East in the winter of 2020/21. Autumn/Winter drilling is designed deliberately to avoid the island's tourist season.

PEDL143 "A24" Prospect

The licence lies immediately to the west of the Company's Horse Hill licences (UKOG 85.635%) and contains the significant "A24" Portland and Kimmeridge oil prospect, a direct geological look-alike to the Company's Horse Hill oil field, situated on-trend some 8km to the east. Several smaller prospects of similar size to the nearby Brockham Portland oil field have also been identified. Multiple potential new drilling sites outside the nearby Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty are under evaluation and drilling is now scheduled to follow directly after the completion of the Company's 9-well 2019/2020 drilling programme, subject to the grant of necessary regulatory approvals.

Stephen Sanderson, UKOG's Chief Executive, commented:
"These extensions, on key appraisal and exploration assets, will permit UKOG to carry out its stated multi-well drilling campaign within the initial term of both licences. The identification of a further large undrilled Portland structure on trend with the Arreton oil discovery makes the Isle of Wight asset even more attractive than before and fully justifies our increase in ownership of PEDL331."

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