Completion of Lincoln Well Operations - Hurricane Energy
Hurricane Energy plc, the UK based oil and gas company focused on hydrocarbon resources in naturally fractured basement reservoirs, announces that the Company has completed the drilling and logging phase of the 205/26b-A well (the "Lincoln Well"). The information communicated below relating to the Lincoln Well is preliminary and will be updated following detailed analysis once the final well data and third party reports have been received and analysed.
The Company is delighted to announce that the Lincoln operations have resulted in a significant fractured basement discovery; the key headlines of which include:
· Hydrocarbons were encountered at the depth of the planned TD of the Lincoln Well resulting in the operational decision to deepen the Lincoln Well;
· Gas chromatography and logging while drilling data indicates a very significant hydrocarbon column of at least 660 metres TVD, comparable to that found at Lancaster; and
· The oil down to ("ODT") was observed at approximately 520 metres TVD below structural closure which is 168 metres TVD below the ODT in the Arco 205/21-1 well, which was drilled on Lincoln's flank in 1995 (the "Arco Well").
The Lincoln Well was planned to exclude testing, and the well is now being plugged and abandoned ahead of the Transocean Spitsbergen drilling rig being demobilised from the Lincoln Well. A further announcement will be made once weather and sea state conditions have allowed for the rig to move to the Halifax well location and for the well to be spudded.
Dr Robert Trice, CEO of Hurricane, commented, "I am delighted that, at the end of an extraordinary year for Hurricane, the Lincoln Well has discovered a significant oil column outside structural closure on our Greater Lancaster Area acreage. Our initial assessment of the drilling results will be subject to refinement by analysis of wireline and sidewall core data, however, current analysis indicates that our pre-drill resource assessments - which were constrained by the oil down to in the Arco Well - of approximately 250 million barrels of recoverable oil for the Lincoln prospect may be conservative. I look forward to Hurricane's imminent operations on the hugely important Halifax well and to simultaneously progressing towards the sanction of the Lancaster Early Production System in H1 2017."