Offshore staff
GODALMING, UK – Hurricane Resources believes its Lancaster discovery west of the Shetland Islands could contain 200 MMbbl of recoverable oil.
The company bases this evaluation on analysis of hydrocarbon distribution and basement fractures in the Lancaster pilot well, drilled in 2009, and a sidetrack drilled in 2010.
Hurricane has commissioned a site survey and is planning for futureLancaster appraisal and development wells. These will be targeted at improving understanding of the structure’s upside and confirming delivery rates from a basement horizontal well.
The company is also working with EPC Offshore on development scenarios. It currently favors a staged development starting with a base case of subsea wells tied into an FPSO, and oil offloaded to a shuttle tanker.
Southwest of Lancaster, Hurricane has unearthed a third basement prospect, Lincoln, on License P1368 which appears to have similar geological characteristics, including proven oil on structure and a well-defined basement fault system.
A prospective well location has been identified and a site survey acquired. Prospective P50 recoverable resources are estimated at 150 MMbbl.
In the same region, Hurricane operates the Amerada-Hess discovered Strathmore field, housed in a conventional sandstone reservoir. Strathmore contains an estimated 32 MMbbl recoverable and could be tied into a Lancaster development.
During 2010, Hurricane was awarded block 204/23b under the UK’s 26th Offshore Licensing round. The block is next to Hurricane’s Typhoon acreage west of Shetland and holds a large part of the mapped basement structure forming the Typhoon prospect.
Last summer the company acquired a site survey over Typhoon and it plans to drill the structure this year, subject to rig availability. Prospective resources could be in the range 149 MMbbl to 1.266 Bbbl.
More recently, Hurricane was offered 10 further 26th round blocks on the West Shetland Platform, southwest of the Shetlands and northwest of the Orkneys. Here the company plans to focus on the Devonian, but there could be potential too in the underlying basement.
2/13/2012
