By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, Apr. 28 -- Nexen Inc. plans soon to drill two horizontal wells in an emerging Devonian shale gas play in northeastern British Columbia.
The summer drilling follows what Nexen calls a "positive" winter program. The company accumulated 100% working interest in 123,000 net acres in Horn River basin (See map, OGJ, Mar. 24, 2008, p. 40).
During the past two winters, Nexen focused on the Dilly Creek area, where it has 85,000 net acres. Average gross shale thickness is 175 m, the Calgary company said.
Assuming a 20% recovery factor, Nexen estimates its Dilly Creek acreage contains 3-6 tcf of recoverable contingent resources. Further appraisal is required.
In the 2006-07 winter drilling season, Nexen drilled two vertical wells at Dilly Creek, recovered core data, and conducted extensive wireline logging.
In the 2007-08 Dilly Creek winter program, Nexen drilled one vertical and two horizontal wells. It fraced three vertical wells to obtain data across the entire gross shale interval and tested various techniques to frac and complete one horizontal well.
Nexen plans to frac and complete the second horizontal well in the 2008-09 winter drilling program. It expects that typical future development wells will involve 6-12 frac sections over longer horizontal lengths.
