Investment Risk Assessment of Potential Hydrocarbon Discoveries in a Mature Basin Case Study from the Bjelovar Sub-Basin, Croatia

摘要

The first part of the paper considers the basic principles of geological risk calculation (POS) based on regional geological analysis. It includes estimation of expected value for outlined potential hydrocarbon discoveries, and eventually calculation of so called 'risk money for available company budget. The described methodology of geological probability calculation is often applied and adapted for characteristic geological settings in different petroleum provinces around the world. It was tailored and validated for a comprehensive input dataset collected in the petroleum province of the Bjelovar Sub-Basin, adapted by dividing up geological events into five probability classes as follows: 1.00 for proven, 0.75 for highly reliable, 0.50 for fairly reliable, 0.25 for unreliable and 0.05 for an undefined event. The methodology is applied to evaluate a potential hydrocarbon discovery of 200,000 m (1,258,000 barrels) of recoverable oil in the analyzed area. The POS of the potential discovery is 28.48% (in Paleozoic-Middle Miocene play). The second part considers the calculation of net present value for the size of potential discovery, which is 13.52 million USD. The investment risk for such a prospect (in mentioned play) was evaluated by using an exponential utility function based on the company 's budget of 50 million USD. The amount of 850,000 risk-neutral dollars is calculated as the certain equivalent to be invested into potential discovery of the expected value of 2.42 million USD. The presented methodology could be easily applied to other Croatian parts of the Pannonian Basin System.