By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, Dec. 13 -- Industry has drilled 38 wells in an 11-township area that penetrated at least part of the Paradox salt section in a play for gas in Pennsylvanian Hermosa Group clastics in the northern Paradox basin in southeastern Utah, said Delta Petroleum Corp., Denver.
"Based on this control, the Paradox formation can be characterized as consistent and contiguous over a large area," Delta said.
Delta's 70% interest Federal 28-11 well reached TD of 9,472 ft on Nov. 19 and began flaring natural gas at bottomhole pressures of 8,000 psi from the lowest interval, referred to as the "O" zone. That is the same clastic interval that caused the surface blowout at the company's Greentown State 36-11 discovery well (OGJ Online, Mar. 2, 2007).
"The pressures experienced in this interval are very consistent with pressures seen in both the Greentown State 36-11 and 32-42 wells, which are 6 miles to the north and 1.5 miles to the south, respectively," Delta said.
Production casing has been run after two weeks of attempts at difficult flow rates and pressures.
The Federal 28-11 well encountered the same sequence of alternating clastic intervals and interbedded salt sections as found in the company's previous two Greentown wells.
Delta is drilling the Greentown Federal 36-24 about ¾-mile south of the 36-11 discovery well and 1½ miles southeast of the Federal 35-12 well, temporarily abandoned this summer due to excessive overpressuring in the upper interval at 5,700 ft.
Federal 36-24, drilled through the same upper overpressured intervals evident in Federal 35-12, did not encounter any excessive overpressuring and appears from mud log shows to be hydrocarbon-bearing in all clastic intervals encountered thus far.
"Information from the other 37 wells drilled in the immediate area also did not encounter this degres of overpressuring, further substantiating our belief that the excessive overpressuring experienced in the Federal 35-12 was anomalous and localized," Delta said.
A pipeline connection to ship Greentown gas should be complete by the end of the second quarter of 2008.
