Surmont Energy Ltd., private Calgary independent, said it has earned an 80% working interest in 12,000 acres of leases 70 km southwest of Fort McMurray, Alta., that contain a best estimate of 1.49 billion bbl of discovered and undiscovered bitumen in place.
A winter program carried out by Bounty Developments Ltd., Surmont’s operating partner, consisted of a $3 million, 13 sq km 3D seismic shoot followed by a $5.5 million program of drilling 10 core holes on seismically defined locations. A cap rock core was also acquired as part of the program.
Surmont has now earned an 80% working interest in the 19 contiguous sections, and Bounty holds the other 20%. Surmont will use the results of the winter program, together with core hole and seismic data from prior years, to commission an updated resource report by an independent evaluation firm.
Surmont has also begun work intended to lead to submission later in 2012 of regulatory applications for the first phase of a steam-assisted gravity drainage project. The first phase would be designed to produce 10,000-12,000 b/d of oil starting in 2015.
Surmont and Bounty will assess plans to explore the rest of the lands in coming seasons to develop more project phases to increase overall reserves and peak production rates.
