Paradise Well Sings for Hess Offshore Ghana

- Paradise Well Sings for Hess Offshore Ghana

Tuesday, June 07, 2011
Hess Corp.

Hess has filed a Notice of Discovery with the Minister for Energy of Ghana for the Paradise-1 exploration well in the Deepwater Tano / Cape Three Points license, offshore Ghana. The well encountered an estimated 490 net feet of oil and gas condensate pay over three separate intervals.

The well was drilled to a total depth of 16,436 feet in a water depth of 6,038 feet. Hess is the operator and has a 90 percent interest in the license, with Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) holding the remaining 10 percent.

Hess will evaluate the well results and work with GNPC and the government of Ghana to plan future appraisal drilling.

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Statoil Discovers Gas in North Sea

- Statoil Discovers Gas in North Sea

Tuesday, June 07, 2011
Norwegian Petroleum Directorate

Statoil, operator of production license 050B, is in the process of completing the drilling of wildcat well 34/10-53 A. The well has been drilled about five kilometers west of the Gullfaks Sør field, in the northern part of the North Sea.

The well is a sidetrack from wildcat well 34/10-53 S, where a gas/condensate discovery was made earlier this year.

The purpose of the well was to prove petroleum in Middle Jurassic reservoir rocks (the Brent group).

Gas was encountered in an approx. 170-meter column in the upper part of the Brent group (the Tarbert formation). The well was not formation tested, but data collection and sampling was carried out. Preliminary estimates of the size of the discovery range between 0.4 and 1.2 million standard cubic meters (Sm3) of recoverable oil equivalents. The licensees are considering tie-in of the discovery to existing infrastructure in the Gullfaks area.

Production license 050B was awarded as a supplement to the third licensing round in 1978. The well was drilled to a vertical depth of 3959 meters below sea level and terminated in the Dunlin group in Middle Jurassic rocks.

Water depth at the site is 136 meters. The well will now be permanently plugged and abandoned.

Well 34/10-53 A was drilled by the Deepsea Atlantic drilling facility. The rig will now continue drilling for Statoil Petroleum AS in the southern part of the Gullfaks Sør field in production license 050.

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Tag Extends Mt. Messenger Play with Oil Discovery

- Tag Extends Mt. Messenger Play with Oil Discovery

Tuesday, June 07, 2011
TAG Oil Ltd.

TAG Oil reported that the recently drilled Cheal-C1 exploration well has now set production casing to total depth, in order to production flow test the light oil potential identified in both the Mt. Messenger (~1600m), and the deeper Moki (~2,200m) formation targets. The Cheal-C1 well was drilled directionally from the new "Cheal-C site" in TAG Oil's Petroleum Mining Permit 38156 (PMP 38156) in the Taranaki Basin, New Zealand.

The Cheal-C1 well was drilled approximately 3.5 km to the northwest of the existing Mt. Messenger producing wells, with results extending the Mt. Messenger oil saturation area over a considerably larger area than previously known. Over 15 meters of net oil-and-gas bearing sandstones were intercepted in the Mt. Messenger with good porosity and free oil encountered while drilling through the zone.

The Mt. Messenger was the primary objective of the Cheal-C1 well however it was deepened to a total depth of 2382 meters (7815 feet), to test the down-dip edge of a large closure within the deeper Moki Formation. Strong oil and gas shows were encountered within a 73-meter thick, high quality section of porous and permeable sandstone. Any future wells directly targeting this Moki Formation structure will be drilled in an updip position, which could potentially intersect substantially more of the hydrocarbon-charged Moki sandstones.

"We are very pleased to have extended the Mt. Messenger play into the "C" block, and look forward to further exploiting this oil-prone area," TAG Oil CEO Garth Johnson commented. "We're also very optimistic about the Moki Formation discovery potential, which is a prolific oil producer in the offshore Maari oil field. However, very few wells have targeted this formation onshore so we will need flow-test data before any conclusions are reached in regards to its commercial potential."

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BHP Billiton First to Start Up Taps in GOM since Moratorium

- BHP Billiton First to Start Up Taps in GOM since Moratorium

Tuesday, June 07, 2011
BHP Billiton plc

BHP Billiton Petroleum announced that it is the first company in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico to bring a newly drilled well into production since the moratorium was enacted in May 2010. The well was brought into production on May 30, 2011 on the BHP Billiton operated Shenzi field.

The SB-201 well was drilled to a total measured depth of 25,126 feet and is currently producing approximately 17,000 barrels of oil per day. This is the eleventh producing well within the Shenzi field and our ongoing development program will ensure that this operated tension-leg platform (TLP) remains a significant contributor to BHP Billiton's high value, Gulf of Mexico production.

BHP Billiton Petroleum Chief Executive, J. Michael Yeager, said, "We are pleased to be able to demonstrate that deepwater drilling and production can resume in a safe and reliable manner. Our organization has worked very hard over the past several months with regulators to have the ability to resume drilling operations and add new production to our deepwater Gulf of Mexico portfolio."

BHP Billiton Petroleum also received approval and began drilling a second deepwater production well (SB-101) on the Shenzi field on June 2, 2011.

The Shenzi facility is located approximately 120 miles (195 kilometers) off the Louisiana coastline and is installed in approximately 4,300 feet (1,300 meters) of water on Green Canyon Block 653, making it the second deepest TLP in the world. The overall field comprises four blocks: Green Canyon 609, 610, 653 and 654.

BHP Billiton Petroleum is the operator with 44 percent equity. Joint interest participants are Hess Corporation and Repsol, each with 28 percent equity.

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