An exciting transformational period ahead for Georgina Energy
“…With a set of highly prospective assets on the cusp of drilling, GEX offers an enticing entry point to the rapidly evolving helium and hydrogen markets…”
The value of Georgina Energy (LON:GEX) has risen by some 150pc since February as the company moves towards developing a set of assets highly prospective for helium and hydrogen in Australia’s prolific Amadeus and Officer Basins .
Still a relative newcomer to the markets, GEX joined the LSE Main Market last July by means of a reverse takeover by special purpose acquisition company Mining, Minerals & Metals.
A gross £5m was raised at IPO, building on previous investment of £6.5m over the previous five years, £2.5m of it contributed by the company’s directors, all seasoned operators in the oil, gas and minings sectors. CEO Anthony Hamilton has more than 35 years’ natural resources experience, and CFO Mark Wallace over 25 years’ experience in the global financial markets. Executive Technical Director John Heugh was the founding director of ASX-listed Central Petroleum, and Non-Executive Director Roy Pitchford brings more than 30 years’ executive and managerial expertise in resource development
GEX has full ownership of the Hussar Prospect located in the Officer Basin and, subject to fulfilment of the conditions of a sales agreement negotiated earlier this year, a 100pc stake in the EPA155 Mt Winter Prospect in the Amadeus Basin in the Northern Territory, together spanning some 3,951 km2.
GEX says ‘Hussar is considered by independent consultants to be one of the most potentially lucrative resource basins in the Asia Pacific region’, with unrisked 2U Prospective (Recoverable) Resources of some 155 BCFG (155 million MCF) of helium, approximately 173 BCFG (173 million MCF) of hydrogen, and around 1.75 TCFGE (Trillion Cubic Feet Equivalent) of hydrocarbons.
Mt Winter, subject to completion of the sale, promises potential net attributable 2U Prospective (Recoverable) Resources of 133 BCF Helium, (132 million MCF), 122 BCF (122 million MCF) of Hydrogen and 1.1 TCF natural gas.
Mt Winter’s Heavitree Formation, the prospect’s primary target, has in the course of historic drilling flowed gases with unusually high concentrations of both hydrogen and helium, up to 11pc hydrogen and 9pc helium, putting it in the top 5pc of concentrations so far discovered anywhere in the world. GEX says the ‘remarkable uniformity of the [prospect’s] Centralian salt sealing formations’ indicate that ‘wherever Helium appears to be a viable target … relatively high concentrations of Hydrogen may well be found’. The Dukas 1 well recently drilled by Santos in the Amadeus Basin, close to the Heavitree Formation, has reported high concentrations of helium and hydrogen.
Hussar scoping study and well redevelopment programme
Since TMS last covered GEX in October the company has continued to define the potential of both Hussar and Mt Winter, and closed on final regulatory clearance for operations to commence.
In February GEX published a scoping study by independent consultants confirming the commercial viability for the development of a gas field at Hussar producing liquid helium, hydrogen, liquid natural gas (LNG) and argon.
The study’s economic assessment, based on a raw gas wellhead delivery price of US$2.0/Mcf and assuming a 20-year project life, estimated the field’s offtake separation plant could generate gross annual revenue of $470.8m, with a Net Present Value (NPV) of $1.64bn and Internal Rate of Return (IRR) of 27.3pc. Capital expenditure was estimated at $1.13bn (for a 40 MMscf/day separation plant) including a 10pc discount rate. Significant upside could be achieved if helium prices exceeded than $700/Mcf, which would facilitate an IRR of more than 35pc at $900/Mcf. Based on potential total field flow rates of between 10 to 60 MMCFGD, and sale prices for raw wellhead gas ranging from $4-10/Mcf, the study estimates potential net pre-tax profits of between $20,000 to $570,000 per day, equivalent to $7.3m to $208m per year.
GEX said the wide range of outcomes reflected ‘the early stage of development of the Hussar project and the potential scalability of production’, but that the study ‘enhances the Company’s understanding of the proposed off-take negotiations following the successful development of both Hussar and Mt Winter.’ GEX is currently engaging with potential offtake partners.
Noting that the forecast revenue stream is generated primarily by helium sales, the study also evaluated a lower cost model focused on helium and natural gas recovery, with the hydrogen component being used to provide energy for the separation and cryogenic production of LNG and helium. This alternative, which would require the design of a bespoke hydrogen oxidation unit to manage the relatively high concentration of hydrogen in the separated helium stream, would allow for additional sales of LNG because the use of natural gas for the plant operations would be at least partially supplanted by the oxidation of the hydrogen component.
GEX’s well redevelopment programme for Hussar will target a 350 km2 area for helium, hydrogen and natural gas. Aztech Well Construction has been engaged to project manage the re-entry, a consultancy that has drilled more than 40 wells in the Perth Basin between 2011 and 2023. Focused on the prospect’s Townsend Formation, the programme will extend the original well drilled in 1982 from 2,040 to 3,400 total depth metres.
Regulatory approval for the programme is at the advanced stage. A site visit for a cultural heritage survey, the final step in confirming there are no culturally sensitive or heritage items at the drilling site, was completed in March. This will allow completion of an environmental impact study to lodged with Australia’s Department of Energy, Mines, Industry Regulation & Safety (DEMIRS), paving the way for drilling approval. Planning for site preparation and civil works is well underway, and all available seismic data is being analysed to enhance pre-drilling structural mapping of the prospect.
Mt Winter regulatory clearance and resource upgrade
The Mt Winter prospect has also moved on significantly over the past few months. GEX entered 2025 by reaching an agreement to acquire full ownership of the prospect from Mosman Oil & Gas for AUD$350,000, which will be funded from GEX’s current cash reserves. Mosman’s exit from the Amadeus Basin is in line with the company’s strategy of rolling disposals. Under the agreement GEX will be entitled to 100pc of the returns from any future production, less a 2.5pc royalty to Mosman.
The agreement is unfolding as planned, with GEX having paid the agreed AUD$50,000 deposit to Mosman and executing the confidentiality agreements necessary to complete the Aboriginal Land Rights Agreement (ALRA) to be lodged with regulators to secure the granting of the exploration permit. On securing the permit GEX will complete the acquisition by paying Mosman the balance of AUD$300,000 from current cash reserves. GEX will then submit a drilling approval application for the first re-entry well, Mt Winter-1. Originally drilled in 1982 to a depth of 2,650 metres, GEX plans to re-enter and deepen Mt Winter-1 to approximately 2,900 metres to test the targeted helium, hydrogen and natural gas potential in the subsalt Heavitree Formation reservoir.
The company has ‘been advised that the draft ALRA agreement should arrive shortly’. GEX’s consultants are currently reprocessing the seismic dataset and interpreting the relevant horizons and basement structures, incorporating updated volumetric details and remapping.
Earlier this month GEX published a CPR stating a significant resource upgrade for Mt Winter. Seismic data reprocessing and re-mapping reported a 15pc increase in net attributable 2U Prospective Recoverable Resources of helium and hydrogen and a 3pc increase in natural gas resources. Subject to GEX funding 100pc of the Mt Winter-1 well, the company will access potential net attributable 2U Prospective (Recoverable) Resources of 133 BCF Helium, (132 million MCF), 122 BCF (122 million MCF) of Hydrogen and 1.1 TCF natural gas.
The CPR also identified a large structural high of up to 60 km2 proximate to the Mt Winter-1 well, representing ‘a significant additional potential closure as a future drilling candidate subject to further additional seismic’. CEO Anthony Hamilton said: ‘We are very pleased with this outstanding 15pc increase (helium and hydrogen) to the recoverable resources in our Mt Winter asset, as well as the identification of a second larger target structure within our existing permit area which could provide significant potential to increase the resource.’
Additional targets
While pressing ahead with its scheduled work at Hussar and Mt Winter, GEX has identified several other high potential re-entry and development targets.
The company is evaluating 10 priority re-entry targets from a possible 168 plugged and abandoned wells within the Centralian Superbasin ‘with potential to recover material volumes of helium, hydrogen and natural gas’. The top two candidates for re-entry will be determined subject to clarification of ownership rights. GEX has entered into a confidentiality agreement with ‘a well-established producing Australian Oil & Gas exploration & production company’ as part of the evaluation process.
Helium and hydrogen supply shortages
GEX is working to position itself to take advantage of increasingly severe supply shortages in both the helium and hydrogen markets.
Helium gas, produced by radioactive decay in rocks and sediments, is the second most abundant element in the universe, but relatively rare on earth. Long used for military and medical applications, helium is in increasing demand for technological and industrial processes such as cryogenics, welding, inert atmospheres, electronics, lifting, pressure and purging, hybrid vehicles and helium-filled hard drives.
GEX’s freshly redesigned website, which takes a close look at the prospects for the helium and hydrogen markets, notes the US Bureau of Land Management, once a key global supplier of the gas, held its last Crude Helium Auction in 2018. Supply has been further imperilled by conflict in Ukraine, leaving the world precariously dependent on a handful of fresh sources in the US and Qatar to make up the shortfall. In recent years prices have exceeded $600 Mcf, with significant new demand generated by the semiconductor and space exploration markets. NASA signed a fiver-year contract in 2022 for 1.2 Bcf space helium supply at $920/Mcf.
Demand is also rising for hydrogen, sought after for the possibilities it affords for greening heat-intensive industrial processes and long-distance transportation, both of which resist electrification. Hydrogen fuel cells open the possibility of powering large vehicles such as trucks, ships, and even planes, beyond the capacity of the lithium-ion batteries that have driven the electric vehicle revolution. As a clean molecule that burns in a similar way to natural gas, hydrogen promises to substantially decarbonise the production of everything from food, packaging and textiles, to ammonia, fertilisers, cement, iron and steel. Hydrogen can also be stored and deployed as necessary to stabilise the grid, compensating for the fluctuating output i inherent to renewables such as wind and solar.
With the ideal of purely green hydrogen remaining elusive due to the cost of the electrolysis process necessary to split hydrogen from water, suppliers such as GEX, producing hydrogen as natural product along with gas and helium, are well placed to meet demand now and into the foreseeable future. Natural gas pipelines can be readily adapted to transport hydrogen.
Outlook
After making swift gains following the company’s IPO last summer, GEX’s share price fell back over the autumn and winter, but has risen sharply this year, moving from just over 4p in February to more than 10p as the company has clarified the scope of its potential resources, detailed its scoping study, and closed on securing the permits it needs to begin drilling. With a set of highly prospective assets on the cusp of drilling, GEX offers an enticing entry point to the rapidly evolving helium and hydrogen markets.
The company currently trades at 10p with a market cap of £10.39m.
Georgina Energy featured in our 10 Oil and Gas Companies to follow in 2025. Click here to view full feature article.
