12th Feb 2007 07:00
12 February 2007
WEEKLY OPERATIONS UPDATE - CAMBAY FIELD TESTING
Oilex Ltd is pleased to advise of progress on the Cambay 72 re-entry and test programme in Cambay Field, Gujarat, India.
Background - Cambay-72 was drilled in September 2006 and its location was selected from maps made prior to the acquisition of the 3D seismic survey. The primary target was the potential Oligocene oil reservoir from which good shows of oil were recorded while drilling and subsequently confirmed by wireline logs.
Indications of oil and gas in poorer quality reservoir were also recorded from the deeper, over-pressured Eocene EP IV interval and the opportunity has been taken to acquire pressure and fluid data from this unit in the current test programme, with the Oligocene potential oil reservoir to be tested in due course.
Operations - The well has been on continuous flow from the Eocene EP IV interval since last week's report and the rate of production has stabilised at about 9-10 barrels of oil per day through tubing on a 2" choke with minor associated gas. The oil is good quality, light to medium gravity. Fracture stimulation and further testing will now be carried out as planned.
Operations Forecast - As anticipated, the Eocene reservoir is relatively low permeability, in common with the quality seen in other commercial fields that produce from this interval in the Cambay Basin. The well will now be stimulated to assess the impact of the stimulation on the flow rate from the Eocene EP IV and will then be observed for several days.
Depending on the results of the stimulation test of the Eocene section, a decision will be made to complete Cambay-72 as a production well from the EP IV interval or to proceed to test, subject to Joint Venture (JV) approval, the shallower Oligocene reservoirs that were the primary target and anticipated to be reservoirs of better quality than the deeper Eocene interval.
Forthcoming 2007 Cambay Work Programme - The forthcoming work programme, including a 3 well drilling programme in second quarter 2007, will continue to focus on exploring the potential higher quality reservoir intervals at the Oligocene and Miocene levels and the deeper potential reservoirs along the main basin axis including the Eocene EP IV and older units. Additional resources are likely to be allocated to the evaluation of the EP IV, given that this was not a primary objective in the initial drilling programme on Cambay.
With regard to the current programme, the test of the Eocene at Cambay-72 has provided pressure and fluid data that are fundamentally important for designing the future development programme for this reservoir interval which appears to be widely distributed over the block. Wireline data acquired from Cambay-72 combined with the 3D seismic survey data, provide the basis for confident mapping of the Eocene EP IV and deeper potential targets across the entire Cambay block (160 km2).
The interpretation of the 3D seismic data, undertaken after Cambay-72 was drilled, indicates that the Eocene EP IV reservoir may improve in quality towards the east in the main basin where bright amplitude events correlate to the EP IV marker in Cambay-72. These bright events have been mapped along a broad, N-S linear trend and may indicate improved reservoir quality and the presence of hydrocarbons at the EP IV level along this trend.
Please refer to the Oilex Web site to view Figure 1.
Figure 1. Potential well locations for 2007 drilling programme plotted on map of Eocene marker and example of 3D seismic anomaly.
Participants in the Cambay Production Sharing Contract are:
Joint Venture Party Participating Interest Oilex (Operator) 45% Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation Ltd 55% Yours sincerely,B. H. McCarthyManaging Director
For further information, please contact:
Ray Barnes, Technical Director, Oilex Ltd Tel. +61 8 9226 5577 (Western Australia)
Archie Berens, Director Pelham Public Relations Tel. +44 20 7743 6679 (UnitedKingdom) 2 ABN 50 078 652 632
Level 3, 50 Kings Park Road West Perth WA 6005 Australia PO Box 588 West Perth WA 6872 Australia
OILEX LTDRelated Shares:
OEX.L