By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, Apr. 9 -- Houston independent Apache Corp. logged 195 ft of net pay across five intervals of the Triassic Mungaroo Sandstone in the Julimar Southeast-1 discovery on Australia's North West Shelf.
Apache has drilled five gas discoveries on License WA-356-P, including Julimar-1, Julimar East-1, Brunello-1, and Brulimar-1.
The latest discovery, which was not tested, was drilled in 502 ft of water about 1.9 miles from Julimar-1, which logged 132 ft of net pay and test-flowed a combined 85 MMcfd of gas from two zones.
"Julimar Southeast-1 encountered both the stratigraphically oldest and structurally deepest gas pay in the field to date," said G. Steven Farris, Apache president and chief executive officer. "Two additional wells are planned on the block in 2008, and we believe the ultimate size of this gas accumulation could be in the range of 2-4 tcf," he said.
Apache owns a 65% interest in the block, with Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Co. holding the remainder.
Apache said the Halyard-1 discovery test-flowed at a peak rate of 68 MMcfd of gas and 936 b/d of condensate from 91 ft of net gas pay in the Cretaceous Halyard sandstone.
The Halyard-1 was drilled in 366 ft of water in Permit WA-13-L, the same production license as Apache-operated East Spar field. Apache owns 55% interest in the block; Santos Ltd. owns the remaining interest. The discovery is on a trend with Apache-operated John Brookes field, which is producing 240 MMcfd of gas from three wells.
That test was on 54 ft of perforations in two intervals beginning at a measured depth of 8,525 ft. It was constrained by the capacity of surface equipment.
"Halyard-1 is our first test of a series of recently identified stratigraphic traps along the front edge of the Barrow Delta," Farris said. "The production test confirms the presence of high-quality reservoir sandstones and their capacity to deliver gas at commercial rates. Apache has identified several other undrilled geologic features with similar geophysical characteristics in the same area."
The company said production from Halyard could be brought to Western Australia's gas market via an existing Apache-operated pipeline 10 miles south of the discovery and through the Varanus Island processing and transportation hub. This proximity to existing transportation facilities is likely to reduce the time and expense required to develop the project.
