By the OGJ Online Staff
HOUSTON, Dec. 14 -- Repsol-YPF SA has a fourth oil discovery on Block NC-186, 800 km south of Tripoli, Libya, in the Sahara Desert.
The Murzuq basin wildcat found a "significant" oil column in the Hawaz sand and tested flow rates up to 2,286 b/d of 41°-gravity oil through a 1-in. choke.
Repsol said the 4,300 sq km block has a number of prospects. It said four of five exploration wells drilled in different structures have been commercial oil discoveries. It also said preliminary evaluations indicate more than 250 million bbl of reserves.
Development plans have been filed with Libya's National Oil Co. (NOC) for two of the discoveries.
The finds are within 30 km of El-Sharara field, which has sufficient capacity to process the crude and a pipeline with spare capacity.
Repsol YPF is operator on the block with a 32% working interest. Partners are NOC, OMV AG of Austria, TotalFinaElf SA, and Saga Petroleum Mabruk of Norway.
