Petroleum Development Oman Discovers Three New Oil Fields

Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) announces the discovery of three oil fields. One field, named Budour Northeast, is located in the Birba area of south Oman. The other two discoveries are extensions of the Ufuq and Dafiq fields, whose discovery was originally announced last year.

“These new fields will contribute to the sustainability of PDO’s oil production”, says John Malcolm, PDO Managing Director. “They have been hooked up rapidly to our pipeline infrastructure, adding to PDO’s production in the short term while delivering valuable production data for the fields’ longer-term development.”

The Budour NE field will be appraised this year on the basis of a long-term production test of the discovery well and the drilling of two or three additional wells. But initial indications are that the field contains a significant quantity of good-quality oil. The discovery well revealed that the field, at a depth of about three kilometers, contained oil along a vertical distance of 67 meters. And a preliminary test showed that it could produce at a stable rate of 8000 barrels per day.

The other two discoveries ”“ in the north of the country lying at depths of about 1500 meters ”“ are hooked up for long-term production testing with a view to developing them as part of the plans being drawn up for the earlier Ufuq and Dafiq discoveries.

Dr Martin Stauble, Exploration Director of PDO, commented: “Budour NE will join the Birba, Harweel and Al Noor fields as the fourth major development based on the south Oman intra-salt carbonate formations. It is an important discovery, not only because of its significant size but also because it opens several new avenues for exploration. The Ufuq and Dafiq extensions, in turn, confirm the geological trends we had mapped in north Oman. They too provide strong encouragement for further exploration drilling, which we have planned for 2007 and 2008.”

Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) is the major exploration and production company in the Sultanate. It accounts for about 90% of the country’s crude-oil production and nearly all of its natural-gas supply. The Company is owned by the Government of Oman (which has a 60% interest), the Shell Group (which has a 34% interest), Total (which has a 4% interest) and Partex (which has a 2% interest). Gas fields are operated by PDO exclusively on behalf of the Omani Government.

Source: www.rigzone.com