The privately-owned Australian oil and gas company started the first onshore oil well last October in more than 50 years in Timor-Leste, which proved productive and led to a second well being sunk as part of a back-to-back drilling campaign. 

Three more exploration wells will be drilled, starting this October, Suellen Osborne, chief executive of Timor Resources, told Energy Voice.

“We will strive to expedite the field development approvals, to establish early oil production within two years,” she added.

“These are exciting times to be working on a project that can be creating jobs and revenues for the nation of Timor-Leste, in the near term. Attracting funding for this development and support from the Australian or Chinese governments for debt funding for infrastructure development will be important.

Timor Resources estimate the cost to have the existing exploration sites in production at around US$46 million.