SOUTH AMERICA

Esso’s well hits oil offshore Guyana

A well drilled by Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Ltd. hit a significant oil discovery in the Stabroek Block offshore Guyana, Exxon Mobil Corp. said. The well found more than 90 m (295 ft) of high-quality oil-bearing sandstone reservoirs. It was drilled to 5,433 m (17,825 ft) in 1,743 m (5,719 ft) of water. Stabroek Block is 6.6 million acres and is about 193 km (120 miles) offshore Guyana. The well data will be analyzed in the coming months to better determine the full resource potential.

Brazil licensing round to launch in October

Brazil’s 13th licensing round will kick off in October this year, Eduardo Braga, minister of Energy & Mining, said. Braga said the round under the concession model will launch with 269 onshore and offshore blocks going under the hammer. The blocks are in a mixture of mature plays, new frontiers and high-potential basins. In the offshore areas, 10 blocks will be offered in the Sergipe-Alagoas Basin, four in Jacuipe and nine in the Camamu-Almada Basin. There will also be seven blocks offered in the Espírito Santo Basin, three in the Campos Basin and 51 in the new frontier Pelotas Basin. The remainder will be onshore.

AFRICA

Tortue-1 well finds more hydrocarbons offshore Mauritania

Kosmos Energy said that the Tortue-1 exploration well in Block C8 offshore Mauritania encountered additional hydrocarbons while drilling to total depth. Tortue-1 intersected about 10 m (32 ft) of net hydrocarbon pay in the lower Albian section, which is currently interpreted to be gas. This is in addition to 107 m (351 ft) of net pay encountered in the primary target, Cenomanian. The well was evaluating the Albian, having been drilled past the Cenomanian, the company said. Subsequent wells will test the seismic calibration of the Albian. No water was encountered in Tortue-1, Kosmos added. Tortue-1 is about 285 km (177 miles) southwest of Nouakchott in 2,700 m (8,858 ft) of water.

NORTH AMERICA

Canada pledges new oil, gas emissions regulations

Canada has pledged to cut greenhouse gas emissions by about a third by 2030, partly by introducing new regulations on its oil and gas sector. Environment Minister Leona Aglukkaq announced the new pledge ahead of a UN climate summit in December. Canada will cut its emissions to 515 metric megatons by 2030, Aglukkaq said. The country isn’t on pace to meet its previous goal and projects emissions to grow—not shrink—over the next five years. Emissions were 726 megatons in 2013, the most recent year for which data are available, and government figures show emissions are set to grow leading up to 2020.

Mexico’s Round One offers onshore conventional fields

The next phase of Mexico’s Round One includes an offering of 26 onshore conventional fields in the Burgos, Tampico-Misantla and Salinas-Sureste basins, Wood Mackenzie said. The key opportunities for companies looking for sizeable onshore fields will be the migrated service contracts and the Pemex joint ventures. New Mexican E&Ps can participate in this round, which has different qualification criteria from the shallow-water development round. Wood Mackenzie research analyst Pablo Medina said this round’s licensing contract will have bidding variables that include additional royalty and work commitment. “Small players” could find the round beneficial, he added.

MIDDLE EAST

GS Energy receives Abu Dhabi onshore oil fields stake

GS Energy Corp. secured a 3% stake in Abu Dhabi’s largest onshore oilfield concession, joining Total SA and Inpex Corp. in a $22 billion venture. The energy unit of GS Holdings Corp. will gain access to about 50,000 bbl/d for its share in the 40-year concession, the company said. GS Energy will pay state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. a signing bonus of $670 million, it said in a regulatory filing in Seoul. Korea National Oil Corp. said it’s joining GS Energy in the venture. By selecting GS Energy from South Korea and Inpex from Japan, Abu Dhabi is for the first time awarding stakes in its biggest onshore producing fields to companies from Asia, where the United Arab Emirates sells most of its crude.

EUROPE

CGG extends seismic program in North Sea

CGG said that there is now a western extension of the Horda BroadSeis-BroadSource 3-D multiclient program in the Northern Viking Graben area in the Northern North Sea offshore Norway and the U.K. The Tampen extension will add 17,000 sq km (6,564 sq miles) of data to the Horda survey program begun in 2014. The Tampen survey will cover a mature, high-potential area encompassing Statfjord, Gullfaks, Snorre and Osberg fields in Norway and several fields in the U.K. The survey extension is expected to be completed in 2016. CGG will have 35,000 sq km (13,514 sq miles) of contiguous, uniform broadband seismic data in the area at the end of the season, the company added.

Tullow receives drilling permit near Heidrun, Njord fields

Tullow Oil Norge AS received a drilling permit for wildcat well 6507/11-11 near the Heidrun and Njord fields in the Norwegian North Sea, the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate said.

The directorate granted the permit for the well, which will be in production license 591. Well 6507/11-11 is in an area containing part of Block 6507/8, part of Block 6507/9 and part of Block 6507/11. It will be drilled about 14 km (9 miles) southeast of Heidrun and about 220 km (137 miles) west of Njord. This is the first well to be drilled on Production License 591.

Maersk discovers hydrocarbons in Danish North Sea

Maersk Oil said the exploration well Xana-1X in the Danish North Sea has discovered hydrocarbons. The Xana-1X well was drilled in license 9/95 in the northern part of the Danish sector with Maersk as operator. The HP/HT exploration well was drilled at a water depth of 68 m (223 ft) and a total drilling depth of 5,071 m (16,637 ft) in the Jurassic Formation. The well was spudded Dec. 8, 2014, by the jackup rig Noble Sam Turner and is currently being plugged and abandoned. The license partners are currently assessing the technical and commercial implications of the discovery and looking at potential for a follow-up, said Martin Rune Pedersen, managing director of Maersk’s Danish business unit, in a statement.

RUSSIA CIS

Lundin receives Morskaya Field production license

Russian licensing authority Rosnedra issued a production license for Morskaya Field in the Lagansky Block in the Russian part of the Caspian Sea to Lundin Petroleum AB. The production license is valid until 2035 and covers about 50 sq km (19 sq miles). Morskaya Field might hold 157 MMboe in gross contingent resources. LLC Petroresurs owns the field. Lundin Petroleum holds a 70% shareholding in LLC Petroresurs. Gunvor Group holds the remaining 30%. Lundin Petroleum has 187.5 MMboe of proven and probable reserves.

AUSTRALIA

BHP lowers priority of Australian LNG project

BHP Billiton Ltd. is lowering the priority of its Scarborough LNG project with Exxon Mobil Corp. in Australia amid a fall in prices and increasing competition from the U.S. “LNG prices are down quite a bit from last year,” Tim Cutt, BHP’s petroleum president, told reporters. The project “falls a bit lower” on the list of opportunities, he said. In September, Cutt said that he backed plans to develop what could become the world’s largest floating LNG project and that BHP was aligned with partner Exxon. Exxon said at the time that while significant progress had been made, it needs to find ways to make the proposed venture more profitable and overcome challenges, including the location and water depths. “We’re probably not moving quite as quickly as we were last year, but it’s still a very important asset” that will be developed at the right time, Cutt said.

Queensland open for business with acreage release

The Queensland Government has put 11,000 sq km (4,247 sq miles) of exploration acreage up for grabs, with most of the available land concentrated in the prospective Cooper and Eromanga basins. State Development Natural Resources and Mines Minister Dr. Anthony Lynham said the state was seeking interest from around the globe in exploring for potentially rich petroleum and gas resources off Queensland’s far southwestern corner. While most of the land being made available is in the Cooper and Eromanga basins, there is one small area of highly prospective land in the Surat Basin. “This is the first of a four-year land release plan for the Cooper and Eromanga basins and is designed to attract junior and major explorers,” Lynham said.

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