PetroNeft, owner and operator of Licences 61 and 67, at the Tomsk Oblast field in the central Russian Federation, today released the following update on its operations.
Licence 61 Exploration/Delineation programme
The Kondrashevskoye No. 2 sidetrack has been drilled down dip from the Kondrashevskoye No. 2 well and penetrated the oil water contact in the objective J1-1 sandstone interval at -2,465 m true vertical depth (“TVD”). The reservoir interval of 3 metres in the sidetrack section was slightly thicker than in the vertical well with the top metre of the reservoir oil bearing.
Based on the results, the well has most likely confirmed the existing independent Ryder Scott 2P reserves of 8.1 million barrels of oil attributed to the field and we will now update the reserves with the Russian State Reserve committee in preparation for field development. The exact timing of development will depend upon how the economics of this field compares with other nearby fields, most notably Arbuzovskoye.
Production casing has been run and cemented in the well so it can be used when the field is developed. The drilling crew is in the process of moving to the potentially high impact Sibkrayevskaya exploration prospect which will commence drilling shortly.
Licence 61 Development programme
The Lineynoye 206 development well drilled from Pad 2 to the north contained 21.9 metres of gross sandstone with 18.5 metres of net pay which is the thickest net pay interval encountered to date in the drilling programme. The reservoir interval was completely saturated with oil and confirmed an oil-down-to of -2,437.5 m TVD, some 15 metres deeper than the previously mapped structural spill point of the field to the north.
The results of this and other recent Pad 2 wells have shown that the northern part of the Lineynoye field has materially thicker pay and extends significantly further north than originally anticipated. This has positive implications for reserves and productivity in this region of the field and for the likelihood of several new structures north of Lineynoye/West Lineynoye to be oil bearing.
Dennis Francis, chief executive officer of PetroNeft, commented: “We are pleased to have proved reserves for economic development at Kondrashevskoye and will incorporate this discovery along with Arbuzovskoye in our 2012 development planning. Pad 2 drilling continues to be very encouraging with the thickest oil pay encountered yet indicating an increased probability that oil has migrated north from the Lineynoye/West Lineynoye field into the various structures contained in the undeveloped Emtorskaya High area.”
