Oil and gas exploration and development company Cairn Energy has started drilling the third appraisal well as part of the SNE oil field appraisal program offshore Senegal.
The second appraisal well, SNE-3, was completed last week. Cairn is using the 2013-built drillship Ocean Rig Athena for the company’s three well appraisal program offshore Senegal.
According to FAR, Cairn’s partner in the project, the BEL-1 well will be drilled in approximately 1,100 metres of water and drilled to a TDVSS (total vertical depth subsea) of approximately 2,757 metres before an evaluation program including logging and coring is undertaken.
FAR added that the aim of the appraisal program is to progress towards proving a minimum economic field size for the SNE discovery, which FAR estimates to be approximately 200 million barrels of oil. In addition, the BEL-1 well will drill the Bellatrix exploration prospect which will evaluate the untested Buried Hills play. BEL-1 will also be deepened to appraise the northern portion of the SNE oil field.
According to plans, drilling of the BEL-1 well will be followed by a wireline logging and coring program before the well is plugged and abandoned and BEL-1 operations are expected to be completed next month.
Cairn has a 40% WI as Operator in three blocks offshore Senegal (Sangomar Deep, Sangomar Offshore and Rufisque); ConocoPhillips has 35% WI, FAR Limited 15% WI and Petrosen, the national oil company of Senegal, 10% WI. The three blocks cover 7,490km2.
SNE resource estimate goes up
Simon Thomson , Chief Executive, Cairn Energy said: “We are delighted with the results to date of our multi-well evaluation programme offshore Senegal, which has confirmed the scale and extent of the significant resource base in this world class asset.
“Cairn’s 2C current resource estimate for the SNE field has gone up by 20 percent and the positive results of the latest appraisal well provide the potential to further increase the size of the SNE field.”
Cairn resource estimates of the SNE-1 discovery in the Sangomar Deep Offshore block upgraded following the incorporation of SNE-2 well results to: P90 (1C) increased by 30% to 200 mmbbls; P50 (2C) increased by 20% to 385 mmbbls; P10 (3C) increased to 690 mmbbls.
Resource upgrade does not include results of the SNE-3 appraisal well where data analysis is ongoing.