Carnarvon Energy Limited ('Carnarvon') (ASX:CVN) is pleased to provide an update on exploration prospectivity and potential near-term drilling opportunities acrossthe company's acreage in the Bedout Subbasin. More than 100 prospects have been identified across Carnarvon's acreage (WA-435-P, WA-436-P, WA-437-P and WA-438-P (collectively 'Bedout Permits')), covering a broad range of play styles. The top five prospects in each permit have been re-assessed following the successful Pavo discovery this year, with potential for high grading to drilling status. These top prospects contain both gas and liquids focused targets. The mean prospective resources of the top 20 prospects add up to over 1.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent (Pmean, gross). This, and the high average probability of geological success, underscores the potential for more discoveries in the highly prospective Bedout Sub-basin. ASX disclosure: The estimated quantities of petroleum that may potentially be recovered by the application of a future development project(s) relate to undiscovered accumulations. These estimates have both a risk of discovery and a risk of development. Further exploration, appraisal and evaluation is required to determine the existence of a significant quantity of potentially recoverable hydrocarbons.

Carnarvon Managing Director and CEO, Mr Adrian Cook, said: 'I am very excited to share this update on the significant prospectivity of the Bedout Sub-basin, with the top 20 out of over 100 identified prospects totalling over 1.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent. Given the success rate in the basin of nearly 70%, Carnarvon is confident the drilling of these wells will add to our already extensive resource base, providing potential future tie-backs to Dorado or supporting new standalone project hubs. Several prospects are now being high graded as potential near-term drilling campaigns. Discussions are ongoing within the joint venture to determine where we focus our drilling, and we look forward to sharing those plans as they unfold. All this exciting potential is underpinned by the Dorado and Pavo discovered resources of over 200 million barrels of oil and associated gas, with the liquids development the first step in unlocking the significant potential of the Bedout Sub-basin.'

Bedout Sub-basin exploration history

The March 2022 Pavo-1 discovery marked another exciting period of exploration in the Bedout Sub-Basin, following a string of successful wells between 2014 and 2018 including the Phoenix South, Roc and Dorado discoveries. Carnarvon recognised the promise shown by BP's Phoenix-1 discovery in 1980 (which discovered around 10 million boe of gas in the Barret and Hove member sandstones) and the potential for 3D seismic to improve imaging and acquired the Bedout Permits in 2009. The first 3D seismic acquired in 2012 showed dramatic data quality improvement. Four out of the six exploration wells drilled in the 3D-era of the past decade have encountered oil and/or gas condensate. This success rate of 67% from 3D-era exploration wells is world-leading. In early 2022 Pavo-1 encountered a 60m gross oil column, with 46m of net oil pay. The reservoirs have high porosities, ~19%, and permeabilities in the range of 100 to 1,000 millidarcies (mD). Initial analysis indicates light sweet oil with about 52 degrees API and a low gas-oil ratio. The 2C (unrisked best estimate contingent) resources are about 43 million barrels of oil. Pavo-1 was drilled on the northern culmination of a pair of closures, Pavo North. Further low-risk upside exists in the undrilled southern structure, Pavo South. Interim analysis of rock samples and fluid samples acquired during the drilling has supported a review of the potential of Pavo South, and Carnarvon has upgraded the Pavo South Prospective Resource to 66 million barrels of oil (Pmean, gross) with an improved chance of success of 60% (Pg). This is in addition to the discovered oil in Pavo North. Pavo represents a low-cost tieback opportunity to the planned Dorado development. Pavo is also significant in that it discovered hydrocarbons over 40km east of the Phoenix-Dorado Corridor, substantially de-risking and opening up the exploration potential of a very large area. Following Pavo-1, the joint venture has been assessing prospects in the Bedout Sub-basin which have the potential to generate material further value through either tie-back opportunities to the Dorado project, or as potential standalone development hubs.

Data quality improvement

Improved seismic data acquisition and reprocessing technology, combined with feedback from the growing number of wells drilled in the Bedout Sub-basin, has enabled the quality of information used to define future potential drilling prospects to improve.

An example is shown in Figure 2, which compares 2D and 3D lines south-east of Dorado. Substantial data quality improvement can be seen from 2D seismic to 3D, and again in further reprocessing of the 3D. This allows far more accurate interpretation and mapping of trapping elements, allowing for significant prospect de-risking and better estimation of prospect volumes. Ongoing learnings are constantly being applied to the rest of the acreage resulting in improved understanding of the many plays, greater confidence in, and de-risking of the entire prospect portfolio.

Contact:

Investor

Thomson Naude

Chief Financial Officer

Phone: (08) 9321 2665

Email: investor.relations@cvn.com.au

Media

Josh Lewis

Senior Media Advisor

Spoke Corporate

Phone: 0412 577 266

Email: lewisj@spokecorporate.com

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