Offshore staff
WEST PERTH, Australia — Pancontinental Energy, as operator of the PEL 87 offshore Namibia, has applied to the country’s Ministry of Mines and Energy to formally approve entry of the permit entering into the first additional exploration period.
Under the current (first) license period, the partners had to invest a minimum of $5 million in exploration-related activities, which they have exceeded.
Much of the expenditure relates to the acquisition and processing by CGG of a 6,593-sq-km 3D survey, fully funded by Woodside Energy.
The planned first additional exploration period would run from Jan. 23, 2024, to Jan. 22, 2026, with an associated commitment to either drill one exploration well, or acquire new 3D or 2D seismic data, if the CGG data does not reveal a potentially drillable prospect.
CGG has sent Pancontinental an early pre-stack depth migration (PSDM) volume, but full interpretation will have to wait until the final PSDM and angle-stack gathers come through.
The fast-tracked data show positive indications of a potential mature Kudu Shale oil source formation directly beneath the Saturn turbidite complex. Previously Brazil’s HRT Participações em Petróleo drilled the dry-hole Moosehead-1X well on PEL 87 in 2013, targeting Barremian carbonate reservoirs within a four-way dip closure.
However, the well was drilled away from the main Saturn turbidite complex, encountering only mudstones at the Late Aptian level and no turbidite-related sandstone reservoirs.
There was no porosity development within the tested carbonates, although there were wet gas shows that increased in wetness with depth. And the well did intersect the Kudu Shale, a thick and regionally extensive oil source rock thought to be the primary source for the recent oil discoveries made by TotalEnergies and Shell on-trend to the south.
Pancontinental's interpretation suggests the Kudu oil shale would likely be at a greater depth within the vicinity of the Saturn turbidite complex, which means the Kudu source formation could be at a more mature level than at Moosehead-1X.
10.27.2023
