London listed Energean Oil &Gas, which pulled out of Egypt and other countries to concentrate, in part, on Morocco, has derailed badly in its first operation in the Northwest African kingdom.
Its exploration target in the appraisal well, Anchois-3, has been a spectacular disappointment, with the prognosed gas bearing reservoirs turning out to be water wet.
“Clearly, we don’t see the upside we were hoping for that would justify a major development,” Energean chief executive Mathios Rigas told analysts.
The project’s commerciality, he declared, “will depend on the type of development and negotiations we will have to have with Moroccan government about gas prices”.
But Chariot Energy, which sold part of its equity to now-operator Energean, is looking at the bright side. “Further detailed work will be needed to understand the impact of these results,” it says in a release.
Anchois-3 was to test the eastern upside of the Anchois gas field, discovered with the Anchois-1, which had been audited as hosting total remaining recoverable resource in excess of 1Trillion Cubic Feet (Tcf), comprising 361Billion Cubic Feet (Bcf) 2C contingent resources and 690 2U prospective resources.
The appraisal and exploration well, Anchois-2, “drilled safely, on time, and on budget, discovered excellent quality, dry gas across seven reservoirs with approximately 150 metre net pay”, Chariot had reported.
With Anchois-3 result, Chariot’s claim that the Anchois gas field “covers an area of approximately 1,794km²”, is also up in the air. The water depths range from the coastline to 850 metres.
The current plan may also be in abeyance. It was to be subsea-to-shore development involving three initial producer wells, comprising the existing Anchois-2 well, the Anchois 3 well and potentially an optional fourth well.
Chariot itself describes the well as a pilot hole, saying “the primary objective of the initial pilot hole was to evaluate the upside exploration potential of reservoirs in the Anchois Footwall prospect, which were found but are interpreted to be water-bearing.”
The so called pilot hole was plugged and abandoned, and a sidetrack — the main well bore now drilling ahead has intercepted gas in the B sands, one of the five-already encountered- sands that were meant to be appraised before the probe goes deeper to target the North Flank exploration prospect which could hold 213 Bcf of gas.
“Preliminary interpretation indicates the presence of gas bearing reservoirs in the B sands”.
