Whitebark Energy Limited announced progress on clean-up flow rates following completion of hydraulic fracture stimulation operations at the Rex-4 development well at the Company's 100% owned Wizard Lake Oil and Gas Field in Alberta, Canada. The Rex-4 well was allowed a ‘rest' period prior to commencing clean-up; all incremental production is going directly to market via Whitebark's 100% owned facilities at Wizard Lake. Initial managed clean-up flow rates from the Rex-4 well were reported as ~230 barrels of fracture stimulation fluid per day on November 20, 2022, at a pump-rate of 3 strokes per minute.

Oil traces were noted in the recovered fluid on November 22, 2022 at a total of approximately 800 barrels of recovered fluid. Pump rate has been gradually increased to 5.5 spm as of December 13, 2022, with accompanying flow rates of ~500 barrels of fluid per day, and is being increased to 6 strokes per minute at January 9, 2023. Current oil cut is approximately 15% and increasing steadily.

Rex-4 currently sits at ~48% recovery of injected fluid. Eventual oil cut is expected to be approximately 40% (as demonstrated in wells Rex-1 through Rex-3) and this will occur once all load fluid is recovered. This is a standard oil-saturation for sandstone reservoirs.

Rex-4 is performing according to expectations and by comparison to the other wells. Overall field production at Wizard Lake has increased to ~180 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boe/d) from ~50 boe/d prior to gradually bringing Rex-4 online. Rex-4 is currently contributing ~25% of total production and this will increase as the oil cut at Rex-4 increases.

The Company's strategy remains to manage the Rex-4 wellbore carefully as it is brought into stabilised production. During the clean-up period flow rates have been gradually increased as appropriate based on the behaviour of the well. As the frac fluid is increasingly recovered, Rex-4 oil flow-rates will be increased gradually over the course of several weeks to the modelled stabilised initial production rate of 300 bopd plus associated gas.

Company believes that this strategy will contribute to greater well lifespan and increased ultimate recovery. Whitebark has modelled ultimate post-clean up production rates of approximately 300 barrels of oil and 1,400 mscf gas per day which will lift total Wizard Lake production to approximately ~750 boepd. The Company expects ultimate recovery of approximately 146,000 barrels of oil and 1.3 Bcf gas from Rex-4 The Company successfully ran 50 hydraulic fracture stimulation stages in the target Rex Sandstone reservoir at an approximate interval of 40m per the completion plan.

The fracture stimulation program was the most ambitious yet at Wizard Lake and was consistent with the strategic plan of increased horizontal length and a greater number of fracture stages than in previous wells. Each of the fifty 30 Tonne fracs consisted of 1 tonne of 50/140 sand followed by 29 tonnes of 16/30 sand with final concentrations of 600-800 kg/m3. A total of 1,483.5 tons of proppant was pumped during the program.

Wizard Lake Oil and Gas Field - Immediate development potential: It is planned for the next four Wizard Lake wells (Rex-5 through Rex-8) to address existing Proved (‘1P') Reserves which is calculated to be 2.3 million barrels of oil equivalent,. Whitebark plans to drill and complete all four wells from the existing well pad without further infrastructure investment required. The Company has identified 20 additional development locations which will target the remainder of the Company's 2P reserves (5.12 million barrels of oil equivalent in total) and contingent resources (an additional 4.7 mmboe).