7th Dec 2018 10:57
LONDON (Alliance News) - Ophir Energy PLC on Friday said an exploration well at its Sampang production sharing contract in Indonesia has discovered gas.
Ophir is an upstream gas and oil exploration and production firm focused on Africa and Asia and holds a 45% participating interest in Sampang.
The Paus Biru-1 exploration well was drilled to a total measured depth of 710 metres and encountered an estimated 29 metres of net pay within its target reservoir.
A drill stem test, taken over an interval between 576 and 605 metres, flowed gas at a rate of 11.2 million standard cubic feet per day. This was sustained over a period of five hours.
The well was then shut in for nine days to build pressure prior to a maximum flow test. This test produced 13.8 million standard cubic feet per day for 55 minutes.
Subsequent to this, the well has been plugged and abandoned as a gas discovery and development plan are prepared for regulator submission.
The approved budget for the Paus Biru-1 well was USD15 million.
Ohir acquired its interest in Sampang from Australian oil and gas company Santos Ltd, alongside a number of other assets in Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Bangladesh.
"This is a strong endorsement of the assets acquired from Santos earlier this year," said Ophir Interim Chief Executive Alan Booth.
"Paus Biru is an example of the attractive near field exploration opportunities within the Sampang and Madura [production sharing contracts]. Such discoveries can be highly valuable as they deliver both fresh production volumes and extend the economic life of the fields already in production," Booth added.
Ophir also provided an update on its wholly-owned Bualang oil field in the gulf of Thailand, where the first part of a phase four development drilling programme has now been completed.
Four workovers and three new production wells were drilled at Bualang, which have all been bought on stream. Bualang's production in November averaged 9,600 barrels per day versus the year-to-date average of 8,000 barrels.
Ophir said that a step out exploration well at Bualang, which had been intended to test a target to the north of the field, was drilled as part of the campaign.
However, the main target of this step out was "not well developed" and has therefore been "abandoned as a dry hole".
The Bualang drill campaign came in under its USD31 million budget at USD25 million.
Shares in Ophir were up 1.7% at 33.65 pence on Friday.
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