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Alliance News
Gulfsands Petroleum PLC saw its shares rise Tuesday after it found a second gas reservoir on the Rharb Centre Permit in Morocco, and said it will target what it thinks is substantial additional gas exploration potential in an adjacent fault block with drilling in 2015.
In a statement, the oil and gas producer and explorer said it had completed drilling the Dardara Southeast 1 well two days ahead of schedule and had encountered a gas bearing reservoir of “excellent quality”, its second consecutive successful gas exploration well on Rharb Centre Permit.
The well was drilled to a total depth of 1,153 metres measured depth and encountered the primary reservoir target interval on prognosis at a depth of 875 metres measured depth.
“Significantly elevated gas readings obtained while drilling, as well as interpretation of geological samples and wireline logs, indicate the presence of a gas bearing sandstone reservoir section of excellent quality,” it said.
Detailed petrophysical evaluation of the wireline logs from the well yielded an initial interpretation indicating a 53 metres gross thickness of “excellent quality” reservoir sand between 875-928 metres measured depth, with a net gas bearing sand thickness of 16 metres, evaluated average gas saturation of 68% and average porosity of 34%, Gulfsands said.
A gas-water contact was observed in the well at approximately 895 metres measured depth, as evidenced by wireline log and formation pressure data, it added.
Gulfsands said it didn’t drill down to the original planned total depth of 1,280 metres because it found over-pressured shales in the lower section of the well-bore and it wanted to ensure that the well-bore integrity was maintained for wire-line logging operations. The well will now be cased and cemented, then perforated, completed and, subject to a clean-up flow period, suspended as a future gas production well, a process set to take 10 days.
“In addition to encountering a potentially highly productive net gas bearing interval of 16 metres, the DRC-1 well result indicates substantial additional gas exploration potential to exist in an adjacent and up dip fault block and this will be targeted in drilling during 2015,” said Gulfsands.
It said it will now move the drilling rig to the Douar Ouled Balkhair drilling location.
“We are delighted with the results of the drilling operations and petrophysical evaluation of the DRC-1 well which point to it being the best exploration success that the Company has achieved in Morocco to date. We look forward to completing the well and observing the production performance during well clean-up operations,” Chief Executive Mahdi Sajjad said in the statement.
“The results have given us a firmer understanding of the local geology and the indication of further gas exploration potential to exist up dip in the Dardara South East structure is particularly pleasing,” he added.
Gulfsands Petroleum shares were up 8.7% at 27.44 pence early Tuesday, making it one of the best performing stocks on the day in the AIM All-Share index.
By Steve McGrath; stevemcgrath@alliancenews.com; @stevemcgrath1
