Providence Offered New Licence over Dragon Gas ...

12^th January 2012
Embargo 7am

PROVIDENCE OFFERED NEW LICENCE
OVER DRAGON GAS DISCOVERY, OFFSHORE UK

Providence Resources P.l.c., ('Providence') the London (AIM) and Dublin (ESM) listed oil and gas exploration and production company, is pleased to confirm that its wholly owned UK subsidiary, PR Singleton Limited, has been offered an exploration licence over UK seaward block 103/1 in the St George's Channel  Basin, offshore Wales. The offer was made by the UK Government's Department of Energy & Climate Change (DECC) following an out of round application by PR Singleton Limited (Operator, 50%) and Star Energy Oil & Gas Ltd (50%). The block contains the Dragon gas discovery.

Tony O'Reilly, Chief Executive of Providence, said:

"We are very pleased to have been offered this UK block, which is adjacent to Irish licence SEL 1/07 which Providence operates 100%. The Dragon gas discovery is mapped to lie within both the UK and Irish sectors and the award of this new block will allow Providence to move forward with the drilling of its planned appraisal well."

CONTACTS:

Providence Resources Plc Tony O'Reilly	Tel: [phone]
Powerscourt   Rob Greening/Lisa Kavanagh	Tel: [phone]
Murray Consultants Pauline McAlester	Tel: [phone]
Cenkos Securities Plc Adrian Hargrave/Nick Wells	Tel: [phone]
J&E Davy Eugenee Mulhern/Stephen Barry	Tel: + 353 (0)1 679 6363

ABOUT PROVIDENCE
Providence Resources Plc is an Irish based oil and gas exploration company whose shares are traded on the AIM market in London and on Dublin's ESM market. Providence's portfolio of production, appraisal and exploration assets includes licence interests in Ireland (offshore) and the United Kingdom (onshore). In 2011, Providence announced plans to invest with its partners upwards of $500 million in the drilling of a number of exploration and development wells in 6 different basins offshore Ireland. This multi-year programme, which commenced in November 2011, represents the largest drilling campaign ever carried out offshore Ireland. www.providenceresources.com.

ABOUT DRAGON
The Dragon gas discovery is situated in c. 100 m water depth in the St George's Channel Basin offshore Wales and SW Ireland. The 103/1-1 discovery well was drilled in 1994 by Marathon Oil and flowed c. 22 MMSCFGD & 120 BOPD from sands of Upper Jurassic age. Recent third party reprocessing of the existing 3D seismic data has indicated that the Dragon discovery may contain up to c. 300 BSCF GIIP.

ANNOUNCEMENT
This announcement has been reviewed by John O'Sullivan, Technical Director, Providence Resources P.l.c. John holds a B.Sc. in Geology from University College Cork, Ireland, an M.Sc. in Applied Geophysics from the National University of Ireland, Galway and a M.Sc.in Technology Management from The Smurfit School of Business at University College Dublin. John is presently working part-time on a PhD dissertation at Trinity College, Dublin. John has worked in the offshore business for 20 years and is a fellow of the Geological Society of London and member of The Petroleum Exploration Society of Great Britain. Definitions in this press release are consistent with SPE guidelines.

SPE/WPC/AAPG/SPEE Petroleum Resource Management System 2007 has been used in preparing this announcement

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Source: Providence Resources plc via Thomson Reuters ONE

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