Rig

The exploration well drilled by the consortium led by Nido Petroleum Philippines at the Baragatan prospect in offshore Palawan has proven to be unsuccessful.

The consortium has decided to plug and abandon the Baragatan-1A well, which is located within Service Contract (SC) 63, a 10,560km² petroleum block in offshore Palawan.

The well, which was drilled to a depth of 2,681m in the Palawan basin, encountered a series of reservoirs that were found to be of poor to good quality.

Analysis found that gas saturation was low, suggesting that additional evaluation and testing was not warranted.

Nido Petroleum holds 20% interest in the contract area, while Dragon Oil and state-owned Philippine National Oil Co-Exploration own 40% each.

Dragon Oil CEO Dr Abdul Jaleel Al Khalifa said: "The exploration drilling in the Philippines did not discover commercial hydrocarbons.

"Analysis found that gas saturation was low, suggesting that additional evaluation and testing was not warranted."

"While with this well we fulfilled our work obligation, we aim to integrate the information provided by the Barragatan-1A well into the regional geological picture and assess our future interest in the block."

Nido managing director Phil Byrne said: "The well has, however, provided the SC 63 joint-venture with valuable new technical information, which now requires integration into current subsurface models, from which the forward exploration strategy for the block will be determined.

"The company’s successful strategy of farming out equity in wildcat exploration wells has preserved cash flow for further exploration activity in the south-east Asian region going forward."

Image: The Baragatan-1A exploration well was drilled to a depth of 2,681m in the Palawan basin. Photo: courtesy of suwatpo / FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

Energy