Gulf Keystone All Smiles over Shaikan Appraisal Program

- Gulf Keystone All Smiles over Shaikan Appraisal Program

Monday, September 05, 2011
Gulf Keystone Petroleum Ltd.

Gulf Keystone provided an update on its ongoing exploration and appraisal program for the Shaikan block in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Shaikan is a major discovery with independently audited gross oil-in-place volumes of between 4.9 billion barrels to 10.8 billion barrels calculated on the P90 to P10 basis with a mean value of 7.5 billion barrels.

Shaikan-2 Well Test Update

Further to the announcement on the new Triassic discovery with the Shaikan-2 Appraisal Well, the Company has completed a flow test in the lower section of the Kurre Chine B zone in the Upper Triassic zone of the Shaikan-2 Appraisal Well drilled approximately nine km to the south-east of the Shaikan-1 discovery well.

The Kurre Chine B flow test in Shaikan-2 achieved flow rates of 2,600 barrels of 40 degree API oil per day with associated gas of 5.4 MMcf per day through a 48/64"choke.

So far, the Company has conducted three wells tests on Shaikan-2 with the maximum aggregate flow rate in excess of 15,000 barrels of oil per day ("bopd") with up to five additional tests still to be performed as part of the ongoing Shaikan-2 testing program in the Triassic and Jurassic. The next test will be conducted on the upper section of the Kurre Chine B.

Shaikan-4 Drilling Update

The Shaikan-4 Appraisal Well, drilled six km to the west of the Shaikan-1 discovery well, is currently drilling ahead at a measured depth (MD) of 2,580 meters. Preliminary well logs through the upper Jurassic (down to the top of the Butmah formation) indicate that the net pay count on this well for the upper Jurassic reservoirs is significantly better than those achieved with either Shaikan-1 or Shaikan-2.

John Gerstenlauer, Gulf Keystone's Chief Operating Officer commented, "This latest in a series of successful Shaikan-2 well tests follows the announcement of the new Triassic discovery made with this well earlier this month. Together with the progress in the Shaikan-4 drilling operations and the oncoming spudding of Shaikan-5, it is a confirmation of Gulf Keystone's success in both drilling and proving the value of the giant Shaikan field, which is our immediate focus".

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Gulf Keystone Updates Ops at Shaikan Wells

- Gulf Keystone Updates Ops at Shaikan Wells

Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Gulf Keystone Petroleum Ltd.

Gulf Keystone is currently in the commissioning phase of oil export operations from its Extended Well Test (EWT) facility close to Shaikan-1 and Shaikan-3.

The commissioning phase, involving final preparations and customary checks and tests on all elements of the process, including loading and transportation logistics, as well as metering and receiving facilities, is underway in order to enable the Company to steadily ramp up export volumes to 5,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd) with an eight month target of over 10,000 bopd. To date just over 3,700 barrels of oil have been delivered to the storage tank facilities at the export pipeline injection point.

Prior to commencing the commissioning phase the storage tank at the EWT facility was emptied of approximately 21,000 barrels of oil, which have been sold into the domestic market in order to allow preparations for oil export to commence.

All volumes of oil are in addition to those previously reported in the Annual Results on April 11, 2011.

The Company will provide a further update on oil export operations once the commissioning phase is complete and stabilized export volumes have been injected into the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline.

John Gerstenlauer, Gulf Keystone's Chief Operating Officer commented, "Gulf Keystone is making good progress toward commencing oil exports from our Shaikan facilities at the initial intended rate of 5,000 bopd following the current commissioning phase. We look forward to delivering stabilized export volumes of Shaikan crude for shipment via the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline."

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Gulf Keystone Spuds Shaikan Appraisal Well

- Gulf Keystone Spuds Shaikan Appraisal Well

Friday, May 27, 2011
Gulf Keystone Petroleum Ltd.

Gulf Keystone announced that the Shaikan-4 Deep Appraisal Well has spudded on the Shaikan block in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq on Friday May 27, 2011.

Shaikan-4 is the second deep appraisal well to be drilled on the Company's significant oil discovery with gross oil-in-place volumes of between 4.9 billion barrels to 10.8 billion barrels calculated on the P90 to P10 basis with a mean value of 7.5 billion barrels.

Shaikan-4 is being drilled 6 kilometers to the north-west of the Shaikan-1 discovery well and is targeted to drill to the top of the Permian to reach the planned total depth (TD) of approximately 3,760 meters.

Gulf Keystone is the Operator of the Shaikan block with a working interest of 75 percent and is partnered with Kalegran Ltd. (a 100 percent subsidiary of MOL Hungarian Oil and Gas Plc.) and Texas Keystone Inc, which have working interests of 20 percent and 5 percent respectively.

John Gerstenlauer, Gulf Keystone's Chief Operating Officer commented, "The spudding of our second deep appraisal well on the Shaikan structure is yet another important achievement in the Company's ambitious 2011-2012 exploration and appraisal programme in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. With the Shaikan-2 & 4 appraisal wells currently underway and the Shaikan-5 appraisal well planned to spud later in 2011, the Company is firmly focused on further proving the world class quality of the Shaikan discovery."

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Gulf Keystone Boosts Estimates from Shaikan Discovery

Gulf Keystone Boosts Estimates from Shaikan Discovery

Thursday, April 14, 2011
Gulf Keystone Petroleum Ltd.

Gulf Keystone announced a major revision of the gross oil-in-place volumes for the Shaikan discovery in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.

The revised gross oil-in-place volumes for the Shaikan discovery, as calculated by Dynamic Global Advisors (DGA), independent Houston-based exploration consultants, are a P90 value of 4.9 billion barrels to a P10 value of 10.8 billion barrels of oil-in-place with a mean value of 7.5 billion barrels and a P1 value of 15 billion barrels.

This is a very significant upward revision from the previously announced range of 1.9 to 7.4 billion barrels of gross oil-in-place with a mean value of 4.2 billion barrels and a P1 value of 13 billion barrels, also calculated by DGA. The revision is based on the data acquired since the last resource evaluation of the Shaikan discovery by DGA issued in January 2010, which was supported by an additional third party analysis by Ryder Scott consultants with a range of gross total petroleum-initially-in-place (PIIP) of 1.52 (P90) to 7.52 (P10) billion barrels.

The new data has been acquired as a result of:

* Shaikan-2 oil discovery and well test in the upper section of the Jurassic section, nine km to the east of Shaikan-1
* Shaikan-1 extended well test production
* Shaikan-3 testing and production results
* Preliminary results of the analysis of 3D seismic data acquired for the Shaikan (599km²) and Sheikh Adi (215km²) blocks
* Evaluation of existing seismic lines and regional geological data for the Ber Bahr, Akri-Bijeel (Bijeel-1 well) and Sheikh Adi blocks.
* PVT (pressure, volume, temperature) analysis of oil samples from the Triassic Kurre Chine tests at Shaikan-1.

The Shaikan-2 appraisal well is now drilling deeper into the Jurassic and is scheduled to drill on into the Triassic. Once the well reaches TD at the bottom of the Triassic or into the top of the Permian interval, the Company will consider a possible further revision of the Shaikan oil-in-place volumes, taking into account additional information from the reservoirs previously only penetrated by Shaikan-1 and from potential additional discoveries from possible zones below those reached by Shaikan-1, projected by DGA to contain an additional 1 to 5 billion barrels of prospective resources.

John Gerstenlauer, Gulf Keystone's Chief Operating Officer, commented, "We have always believed that the initial gross oil-in-place range for the Shaikan discovery was a conservative estimate that would increase as more information became available. This gross oil-in-place volumes revision by DGA, entirely supported by the Company's management and Board of Directors, confirms that belief. We eagerly look forward to additional drilling results from Shaikan-2, the soon to be spudded Shaikan-4 and the remainder of the Shaikan appraisal drilling program. We firmly believe that even with this upward revision the numbers for the Shaikan discovery are still conservative."