Circle Oil encouraged by drilling in Egypt

Circle Oil, the international oil and gas exploration, development and production company, has had more positive results from its drilling in Egypt.

It operates at Al Ola-2, located in the south eastern part of the Al Amir SE field (AASE), downdip and 850m to the north-west of the Al Ola-1 production well and 1,810m south south-east of the AASE-8 water injector well in the Al Amir Development Lease.

The well was spudded on 1 September and drilled to 10,552 ft MD in the Upper Rudeis. The main objectives for this well were to appraise the Shagar and Rahmi sandstones of the Kareem Formation in a downdip location and to evaluate the potential for water injection to support oil production from the updip AASE field wells.

The Shagar sands were found to be oil bearing from 10,143 to 10,158 ft MD, with 15 ft MD of net pay, an average porosity of 13% and an average water saturation of 22%. The Rahmi sands were encountered with poor quality sands.

Although Al Ola-2 was initially planned as an injector, the presence of the oil column in the Shagar resulted in the decision to complete the well initially as a production well from the Shagar sands.

Perforations were completed between 10,143 and 10,158 ft MD. The well has been connected to the production facilities and the Shagar sand flow tested at 2,825 bopd and 2.679 MMscfd using a 64/64" choke. This test flow rate was provided by the operator as part of a variable choke size testing programme to assess the productivity of the well. The Al Ola-2 production rate will be subject to operator control for field management purposes.

At Geyad-D the rig has now been mobilised to drill a production well at the Geyad-D location on the northern flank of the Geyad field, updip of the Geyad-2XST producer. The well's objective is to appraise both the Shagar and Rahmi sands for production in that location. The proposed total depth of the well is 6,050 ft MD into the Upper Rudeis Formation.