Stena drillship arrives on ExxonMobil’s well location in Guyana

Stena Carron, a Stena Drilling-owned drillship, has arrived on location at the Kaieteur Block, offshore Guyana, to drill the Tanager-1 well for ExxonMobil.

According to information provided by Westmount Energy in a statement on Tuesday, the Stena Carron drillship has arrived on location at the Tanager-1 well site on the Kaieteur Block and will start drilling operations imminently.

The Kaieteur Block covers an area of approximately 13,500 sq km at water depths ranging between 2,800 and 3,800 meters.

The block is adjacent to the Stabroek Block, where the Liza, the first oil discovery in Guyana, was made by ExxonMobil in 2015.

Westmount holds an indirect interest in the Kaieteur Block as a result of its c.0.7% interest in the issued share capital of Ratio Petroleum and the Company’s c.5.4% interest in Cataleya Energy Corporation (CEC).

Both Ratio Petroleum and CEC each hold a 25% participating interest in the Kaieteur Block via their subsidiary companies, Ratio Guyana Ltd. (RGL) and Cataleya Energy Ltd. (CEL), respectively.

The Kaieteur Block is currently operated by an ExxonMobil subsidiary, Esso Production & Exploration Guyana Limited (35%), with CEL (25%), RGL (25%) and a subsidiary of Hess Corporation (15%) as partners.

The Tanager-1 well has a target total depth of 8,000 metres and will take an estimated 90 days to drill.

The May 2019 Netherland, Sewell & Associates Inc. (NSAI) report on the Kaieteur Block describes the Tanager Prospect as a stacked reservoir prospect (Maastrichtian to Turonian reservoir intervals) and assigns a ‘Best Estimate’ Unrisked Gross (100%) Prospective Oil Resource of 256.2 MMBBLs to the prospect (Low to High Estimates 135.6 MMBBLs to 451.6 MMBBLs), with an aggregate Probability of Geologic Success (POSg) of 72%.

Furthermore, the NSAI report indicates that the aggregate ‘Best Estimate’ Gross Unrisked Prospective Resources for 9 prospects in the southern part of the Kaieteur Block, where the Tanager prospect is located, is 2.1 BnBBLs (Aggregate Low to High Estimates 694 MMBBLs to 5.85 BnBBLs) implying Net (25%) 525 MMBBLs to each of RGL and CEL across this area which is covered by a 3D seismic survey.

Gerard Walsh, Chairman of Westmount Energy, commented: “Tanager-1 is the first well in a potential multi-well drilling campaign being operated by ExxonMobil on the Kaieteur and Canje Blocks over the next 6 to 12 months.

“This campaign will evaluate high impact Upper Cretaceous prospects in the Liza play fairway with, in some cases, multiple stacked reservoir targets. It also provides Westmount shareholders exposure to a portfolio of drilling outcomes over a compressed timeframe. Success from some of the wells in this portfolio could result in transformational value changes for Westmount”.

In related news, ExxonMobil has also recently awarded a six-month deal to the Noble Sam Croft drillship for operations in Guyana.

Header photo by Ronnie Robertson – shared with permission from the author