Horizon Oil makes second discovery in Beibu Gulf
Horizon Oil advises that drilling of the second of a two exploration well program in the Beibu Gulf Block 22/12 has been completed. The WZ 12-10-2 well is located is located in 36 m of water 1.6 km east northeast of the existing WZ 12-8W platform and about 3.2 km west southwest of the recently drilled WZ 12-10-1 oil discovery (see map below). The well spudded at 2300 hrs China Standard Time on 3rd October 2014 with the COSL Rig ‘HYSY 935’. The current exploration well, WZ 12-10-2, discovered high porosity net oil pay of ~11 m true vertical depth in the Jiaowei T42 formation. The well was drilled to a total measured depth of 1,590 m (1,382 m TVDSS), where granite basement was intersected, as prognosed. Wireline evaluation logging programs, including pressure measurements, fluid sampling, formation imaging and sidewall coring, have been run and confirmed the oil pay in the Jiaowei T42 reservoir has favourable reservoir porosities of about 31% and oil gravity of approximately 29 deg API. The well has been plugged and abandoned and the rig will be released shortly. The 2014 Beibu exploration drilling program has been successfully completed with no safety or environmental incidents. Further work will now be undertaken to evaluate both the extent of the structure and reserves, and assess the most effective route for integrating these additional oil resources into the existing Beibu project.