It is with pleasure that I present to you the 2024 Annual Report for Melbana Energy Limited, yet another busy year for your Company. During the reporting period we completed the appraisal of the three oil bearing formations we had previously discovered in our Block 9 PSC, onshore Cuba. This marks the end of a successful exploration program commenced back in 2021, the best result of which (so far) is the definition of a Contingent Resource of 46 million barrels1 of relatively highquality and easily accessible oil at a location close to existing oil field infrastructure. The next stage of this project’s development is to export the first trial cargo of oil from Cuba before the end of this calendar year. To meet this aggressive but achievable goal has meant driving a number of parallel work streams. These included obtaining the necessary approvals to export and sell Block 9 oil production offshore, establishing an offshore subsidiary for marketing this production, agreeing offtake terms with international commodity traders, developing the necessary logistical capabilities to transport the oil domestically and ship it internationally and negotiating access to the Cuban national oil company’s processing facilities, oil terminal and supertanker base. In addition, preparations for drilling the first production wells into the shallow Unit 1B reservoir have continued apace. We plan to kick that program off in late 2024 once permitting and civil works are completed. In the interim, we plan to undertake workover of the existing Unit 1B completion in our Alameda-2 appraisal well. Our previously stated ambition of 5,000 barrels of oil per day by the end of 2024 is now probably not achievable given we were unable to complete Alameda-3 as another production well. However, a successful workover of the existing completion in Unit 1B and the first couple of additional Unit 1B production wells will hopefully see us reach that goal in the first or second quarter of next year. 02 Melbana Energy Limited Annual Report 2024 1 Independent best estimate (P50), 100% share. Chairman’s Letter
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