Its production increase in 2017 is the most noteworthy of the 11 Shell Divestees
Elcrest, the Joint Venture between Nigerian owned Starcrest and the UK listed Eland Oil and Gas, reached gross peak production of 18,400BOPD, less than 2,000BOPD shy of 20,000BOPD, in the Oil Mining Lease(OML) 40, as November 2017 drew to a close.
It’s a clear result of aggressive work programme by a company which acquired what was almost entirely an exploration asset in 2012.
OML 40 was the least developed of all the 11 onshore OMLs from which Shell and partners divested (selling their equities to Nigerian firms and quasi Nigerian firms) between 2010 and 2015. For the first three years of purchase of the asset(2012 to 2015), production was limited to 4,000BOPD.
Output began to surge after the Asset Management Team (AMT) philosophy was approved in late 2015, allowing joint operatorship of the acreage by Elcrest and NPDC. The partners’ shipping arrangement of the crude (barging), during the 16 month long shut down of the Trans Forcados System, was one of the most successful of the shipping operations during that period.
November 2017 witnessed sharp increases in production by other Nigerian independents, including Shoreline’s OML 30, which breached 70,000BOPD and NDWestern, which also went close to 20,000BOPD, but these assets were not starting from a low base as Elcrest’s OML 40.
Elcrest is on a three well drilling campaign to increase output to 30,000BOPD on the acreage.
