Santos secures Noble rig for Dorado appraisal campaign

Australia’s Santos has secured a drilling rig for its Dorado appraisal campaign located in WA-437-P offshore Australia scheduled to start in April next year.

The joint venture partners in exploration permit WA-437-P are Carnarvon with a 20% interest and Santos, the operator, with an 80% interest.

Carnarvon said on Tuesday that the shallow water depths mean that the joint venture can utilize a cost-effective jack-up drilling rig for its Dorado appraisal wells and that it had secured the Noble Tom Prosser jack-up rig for the wells.

The Noble Tom Prosser was also used to drill the Roc-1 discovery in this area in 2016.

Two wells

The 2019 drilling program is expected to include two Dorado appraisal wells that will focus on gaining further information on the volume of oil, gas and condensate discovered in the Dorado-1 well to build proved reserves which will underpin the Dorado development.

Carnarvon said that the drilling of the first well is scheduled to start around April 2019.

The wells will also focus on determining the flow properties of those hydrocarbons from the reservoirs intersected in order to optimize the Dorado development and obtaining additional data at different locations within the Dorado field.

Carnarvon Managing Director, Adrian Cook, said: “The incredible Dorado discovery earlier this year means we are highly motivated to appraise the oil, gas and condensate within the structure. The objective in 2019 is to enhance our understanding of the volume of the resources recoverable and move to making a Final Investment Decision for development ideally in 2020.”

The Noble Corporation-owned jack-up Noble Tom Prosser recently finished the Bayu Undan infill well program for ConocoPhillips in the Timor Sea. The drilling program consisted of two platform wells and one subsea well connecting into existing offshore infrastructure.