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Egyptian exploration and production company Cheiron announced on Tuesday that it has made a new oil discovery in the Geisum and Tawila West Concession in the Gulf of Suez.
Cheiron (through its PICO GOS affiliate) holds a 60 percent working interest and operatorship in the concession, with KUPFEC holding the remaining 40 percent interest.
The field operations are managed by the PetroGulf Misr Joint Operating Company on behalf of EGPC (50 percent) and Cheiron-KUPFEC partnership (50 percent).
The discovery was made by the GNN-11 exploration well, which was drilled into a fault block to the east of the GNN [North Geisum North Field] oil field development, Cheiron said in a press statement.
The statement said the well encountered 165 feet of good quality vertical net pay in the Pre-Miocene Nubia formation, noting that “this is the first time the Nubia has been found to be oil bearing in the GNN area of the concession.” The producing reservoir in the main GNN field is in the Nukhul formation.
The well was drilled from the recently installed GNN Early Production Facility (EPF) and has been successfully placed on production at a rate of over 2,500 bpd. As result of the new well, and the successful drilling campaign conducted to date on the field, the gross oil production from the Concession has reached 23,000 bpd, compared to 4,000 bpd before the GNN field was developed.
GNN-11 is the fourth well to be completed from the EPF, which is located in the central area of the field and includes a conductor support platform, a mobile offshore production unit and a 10-inch oil export pipeline, tied back to the existing Geisum Star production complex.
A further three wells can be drilled from the EPF and these will be used to complete the current phase of the GNN drilling programme.
According to the statement, the discovery demonstrates that whilst the Gulf of Suez is a relatively mature hydrocarbon province, it still has significant remaining exploration potential with Cheiron and Kufpec planning to drill at least three additional exploration wells in the Concession area.
(Writing by Eman Hamed; Editing by Anoop Menon)
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