After a 29-year hiatus, Iraqi engineers have completed a well at the Missan oil field.
Iraq’s oil ministry said Ali Qubool, general manager of the Missan Oil Company, confirmed the completion of an exploration well in the Dima area of the Missan field.
The company drilled over eleven months to a depth of 4260 metres, yielding clusters of hydrocarbons which “herald the presence of large reserves of oil and gas,” according to the ministry’s statement, translated from Arabic.
The Iraq oil ministry claims the drilling was completed ahead of schedule came at a cost “not exceeding $14 million, much lower than $ 14 million, an amount much less than the amounts demanded by foreign companies in the licensing rounds which identified $ 100 million as a price for the implementation of such work.”
Qubool said that “this achievement indicates that the Iraqi oil companies are competing [with] foreign companies in performance at lower costs.”
Drillers first encountered oil at Dima back in January, a “surprise” discovery that was lauded by oil minister Abdul Kareem al-Luaibi.
