"Our intention is to accelerate the drilling of the well," said Terry Gerhart, vice president of international operations at Noble.

"Hopes are to be able to start the well as early as the fourth quarter of 2011 or possibly slipping into 2012," he told reporters in Nicosia.

Noble has a concession to explore for hydrocarbons in one sea block south-east of Cyprus.

Cypriot officials say the block, known as "Block 12", holds an estimated 10 tcf.

"We currently don't have an exact estimate but we had quite a bit of success on the Israeli side," Gerhart said.

Noble has a concession off neighbouring Israel, where its Leviathan field has an estimated 16 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of gas.

Tamar, another field off Israel, holds an estimated 8.6 tcf. The Cypriot block is about 34 kms away from Leviathan, and 60 kms from Tamar.

Noble had discussed with Cypriot authorities options about how to bring any finds from the Cypriot field to the island, including the option of constructing a pipe line, Gerhart said.