Woodside Exits Planned Greater Sunrise Project

SUBSCRIBE SEARCH ARTICLES NEWS Timor-Leste's national oil and gas company will take full control of the Greater Sunrise fields in the jointly managed maritime area agreed between the Southeast Asian country and Australia. Image by Oleksii Liskonih via iStock

Timor-Leste's national oil and gas company will take full control of the Greater Sunrise fields in the jointly managed maritime area agreed between the Southeast Asian country and Australia.

Australia's Woodside Energy Group Ltd has now agreed to sell its operating stake of 33.44 percent in Retention Leases NT/RL2 and NT/RL4 and Production Sharing Contracts JPDA 03-19 and JPDA 03-20 to Timor GAP. The titles contain the proposed Greater Sunrise project, which consists of the Sunrise and Troubadour gas and condensate fields, discovered in the Timor Sea in the 1970s.

Earlier Timor GAP secured an agreement to acquire Osaka Gas Co Ltd's 10 percent interest.

"While Sunrise remains a high-quality resource, the transaction further simplifies Woodside's portfolio and allows capital and management attention to be focused on opportunities that present the greatest shareholder value", Woodside chief executive Liz Westcott said in an online statement Tuesday.

Timor GAP president and CEO Rui Soares said separately, "We are now in a stronger position than ever to expedite the development of Greater Sunrise and advance the selection of the Timor LNG development concept, bringing us closer to realizing our nation's long-standing aspiration of developing Greater Sunrise on Timor-Leste's southern coast".

Timor GAP will pay Woodside $200 million, consisting of $13.71 million to be paid upon the completion of the transaction, $11.29 million contingent on the project reaching a final investment decision and $175 million contingent on production.

The completion needs to hurdle regulatory approvals and other customary conditions, the companies said.

Advertisement - Scroll to continue

Greater Sunrise is about 150 kilometers southeast of Timor-Leste and 450 kilometers northwest of Darwin, capital of Australia's Northern Territory, according to the owners.

In 2018 Canberra and Dili signed a maritime boundary treaty under which they agreed on joint rights in the seabed containing the project.

"Seventy or eighty percent of the revenue from developing Greater Sunrise will flow to Timor-Leste, depending on the final development concept to be agreed upon by Timor-Leste and Australia", said a joint government statement March 7, 2018.

Woodside said its agreement to sell its stake to Timor GAP "provides for a scenario where the new Greater Sunrise Production Sharing Contract contemplated in the treaty between the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste and Australia establishing their maritime boundaries in the Timor Sea becomes effective prior to completion of the transaction".

In other divestments, Woodside is exiting Trinidad and Tobago with the transfer of its 70 percent operating stake in the offshore Calypso gas field to partner BP PLC.

"Calypso is an early-stage deepwater natural gas project offshore Trinidad and Tobago, where BP has an established business and extensive oil and gas infrastructure", BP said August 6. "BP is the largest supplier of gas to the domestic market and has a 45 percent stake in the Atlantic LNG facility off Trinidad's southwest coast".

Last year Woodside sold its producing oil and gas assets in Greater Angostura to Perenco for AUD 206 million (around $145 million).

Perenco's acquisition included Woodside's operating stakes in the shallow-water Angostura and Ruby oil and gas fields, which at the time were producing about 300 million standard cubic feet a day of gas or around 12 percent of the Caribbean nation's gas production, according to a Perenco statement July 11, 2025.

Perenco now owns 45 percent of Angostura in the 2(C) production sharing contract (PSC) and 68.46 percent in Ruby in the 3(A) PSC. The acquisition also included seven fixed platforms, subsea facilities and an onshore terminal, Perenco said.

In the United States, Woodside exited the proposed lower-carbon hydrogen project H2OK in Oklahoma. Its quarterly report July 23, 2026 cited "challenges facing the lower-carbon hydrogen industry, including cost escalation and lower-than-anticipated hydrogen demand".

In its quarterly report for the third quarter of 2026 Woodside said it would now launch a process to sell part of Texas' Beaumont New Ammonia project, which began production December 2025. Woodside cited "the evolving pace of lower-carbon ammonia market development" for the farm-out.

It continues to expect the project to start lower-carbon ammonia production next year, "subject to commissioning of Linde's low-carbon hydrogen facilities and start-up of ExxonMobil's carbon capture and storage infrastructure", it said in the report published last Wednesday.

To contact the author, email [email protected]

What do you think? We’d love to hear from you, join the conversation on the Rigzone Energy Network.

The Rigzone Energy Network is a new social experience created for you and all energy professionals to Speak Up about our industry, share knowledge, connect with peers and industry insiders and engage in a professional community that will empower your career in energy.

MORE FROM THIS AUTHOR Jov Onsat
Editor