KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 13): Shares in Hibiscus Petroleum Bhd rose to its one-year high this morning after the company said it targets to increase its oil production at the Anasuria cluster in the UK Central North Sea by up to 56% to 5,000 barrels per day (bpd) in the next two years from 3,204 bpd in the financial year ended June 30, 2017 (FY17).

At 9.41am, Hibiscus rose 3.17% or 2.5 sen to 81.5 sen with 45.22 million shares traded. The stock had earlier risen to a high of 82 sen.

The Edge Financial Daily last Friday reported Hibiscus managing director Dr Kenneth Gerard Pereira as saying that the oil and gas (O&G) exploration and production group’s focus is to revitalise its mature assets in order to ensure the group’s profitability.

“Our strategy is to grow by ‘sweating’ mature assets and developing proven opportunities within our portfolio. The recent project enhancements at the Anasuria cluster have given us the confidence to consider more complex execution of projects with higher levels of production upside,” Pereira said at a media briefing yesterday on the group’s corporate and business developments.

This was at the back of the successful completion of two key enhancement projects on the Anasuria cluster through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Anasuria Hibiscus (UK) Ltd, which was designed to improve short- and medium-term performance to compensate for the expected production decline of such a mature asset, while seeking to improve health and safety aspects.

Pereira pointed out that the project enhancements were targeted at two wells that were shut in by the previous operator due to high levels of hydrogen sulphide (H2S), which can corrode production infrastructure.

He said the “souring” job carried out in both wells includes an engineering review of the production system, increasing injection points and using an effective H2S scavenger chemical, establishing standard procedures to manage operations, and rigorous testing of the wells before they were back in production in January and July respectively. The enhancements are expected to add an average of 315 bpd of production from both wells for calendar year 2017.