Carnarvon Petroleum Ltd. reported that it will begin to drill the Outtrim East-1 well on Australia’s North West Shelf in mid-June using the Noble Corp.’s Noble Tom Prosser jack up drilling rig under contract with operator Quadrant Energy. Quadrant was formed in 2015 after the acquisition by a consortium of private equity funds managed by Macquarie Corporate Holdings Ltd. and Brookfield Asset Management Inc. of Apache Corp.’s Australian assets (OGJ Online, June 5, 2015).
“The Outtrim East-1 well will test the extent of the Outtrim-1 oil discovery and upside potential in new oil charged sands to the north and east of the Outtrim-1 well, said Carnarvon Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Adrian Cook.
Cook said positive drilling results from this and other wells “have the potential to materially deliver on Carnarvon’s strategic objectives, namely to find and commercialize major oil and gas resources on the North West Shelf.”
Objectives of the Outtrim East-1 well include testing for the presence of hydrocarbons in the Lower Cretaceous Barrow Group sandstones Pyrenees formation, drilling below the oil-water contact to total depth with log coverage over the zone of interest, evaluating the objective interval for the presence of reservoir and hydrocarbons using quantitative gamma-ray, resistivity, neutron, density, CMR, and sonic logs, obtaining formation pressures and fluid samples over the hydrocarbon-bearing interval, and obtaining conventional core over the Pyrenees formation objective.
The well lies 970 m east of the Outtrim-1 well in 95 m of water with a target interval around 1,400 m below the sea bed.
The Outtrim East-1 well is expected to take 25 days to complete. The net cost to Carnarvon is expected to be $7 million (Aus.) based on its 28.5% interest.
Carnarvon acquired a 28.5% interest in the WA-155-P(1) permit from Inpex in January.
