AMOCO GAUGES GAS/CONDENSATE STRIKE IN COLOMBIA

Exploration in Colombia is heating up with the second recent announcement of a large gas/condensate discovery.

Operator Amoco Colombia Petroleum Co. and partners report their 3 Opon wildcat on the 124,000 acre Opon association contract area flowed at a rate of 45 MMcfd of gas and 2,000 b/d of condensate with 6,000 psi flowing tubing pressure and 9,200 psi bottom hole flowing pressure (OGJ, Sept. 12, Newsletter).

Drilled to 12,710 ft, the strike flowed through a 42/64 in. choke from 1,118 ft of perforations in multiple Eocene La Paz intervals at 10,018 12,238 ft.

News of the Opon strike surfaced 1 week after BP Exploration reported a gas/condensate field discovery straddling the boundary between the Recetor and Piedemonte association contract blocks in the foothills of eastern Colombia's Llanos basin (OGJ, Sept. 5, p. 44).

BP estimates recoverable reserves of the Recetor Piedemonte find at 5 tcf of gas and 250 million bbl of condensate.

Meantime, state owned Empresa Colombiana de Petroleos (Ecopetrol) gave Argosy Energy International unit of Garnet Resources Corp., Houston, permission to proceed with plans to begin commercial production of Mary and Miraflor fields, north of the Caqueta River on 172,000 acre Santana B Block in Southwest Colombia's Putumayo basin. Commercial production from Mary and Miraflor is set to begin by first quarter 1995.

OPON DISCOVERY

D.F. Work, vice president of Amoco's worldwide exploration group, said 3 Opon's performance indicates the discovery is a significant one, but more work is needed before its importance can be fully evaluated.

"To establish the ultimate potential of the field, we need to conduct additional seismic and drill additional delineation wells to better understand the extent of the subsurface structure and the size of the hydrocarbon resources we have discovered there," he said.

The Opon wildcat is about 125 miles north of Bogota. Work said the proximity, of the discovery to potential gas markets there, at Medellin, and at Ecopetrol's 173,000 b/cd Barrancabermeja Santander refinery add to the discovery's attractiveness.

Amoco Colombia became Opon operator earlier this year after acquiring an interest in the tract through a farmout from former operator Hondo Magdalena Oil & Gas Ltd., a unit of Hondo Oil & Gas Co., Roswell, N.M. (OGJ, Aug. 23, 1993, p. 21).

The farmout required Amoco Colombia to spend $12 million on Hondo's behalf during the Opon association contract's fifth and sixth year exploration programs, ending in 1995. Amoco was preparing to drill an Opon delineation well at an undisclosed site.

Amoco Colombia holds a 60% interest in 3 Opon and the contract area, Hondo Magdalena 30%, and Opon Development Co. 10%. Ecopetrol has the right to participate with a 50% interest if the field is declared commercial. That will cut contractors' interests in half.

SANTANA B BLOCK ACTIVITY

Ecopetrol's authorization to begin the next phase of Santana B development allows Argosy and Santana B partner Neo Energy Inc., a unit of Aviva Petroleum Inc., London, to begin installing production facilities in Mary and Miraflor fields.

The companies also plan to lay a 10 mile pipeline to transport Mary and Miraflor production across the Caqueta River to a tie in with the pipeline moving oil from Toroyaco and Linda fields in the southern part of Santana B. The pipeline project, to be finished by first quarter 1995, includes a 1.3 mile buried Caqueta River crossing.

Ecopetrol has declared Mary, Miraflor, Linda, and Toroyaco fields commercial, allowing the state company to assume a 50% interest in developing the fields.

With completion of the Mary Miraflor pipeline, Santana B partners will be able to deliver production by pipeline from all four fields into the trans-Andean pipeline for transport to the Pacific port of Tumaco. That is expected to cut transportation costs to the coast to about $1.30/bbl from $2.48/bbl.

Meantime, Argosy and Neo Energy last month resumed an extended production test of Santana B's 2 Mary delineation well. Colombia's environmental ministry last May lifted a suspension of operations on Santana B invoked in July 1993 after the sinking of a ferry shuttling Mary and Miraflor test crude across the Caqueta River.

At last report, 2 Man, was producing oil at a stabilized rate of 2,400 b/d from one of four apparently productive zones. The test is to continue through October.

Seismic surveys are continuing on Santana B block and the adjacent 118,641 acre Fragua block. And subject to necessary, permits, 1 Esperanza South wildcat is scheduled to spud on Santana B in fourth quarter 1994.

Garnet through operator Argosy owns 55% interests in the Santana B and Fragua association contract areas and Aviva through Neo Energy 45%.