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Pantheon announces Alkaid light oil discovery, 80-100 bpd test
Kay Cashman Petroleum News
Pantheon Resources, which acquired the assets of Great Bear Petroleum in January in what was essentially a merger, said March 25 that the first of the three targeted horizons in its re-entry and flow testing of the Alkaid 1 well confirmed an oil discovery,
The London-based company said a six-foot section “from a c.240 foot interval of net pay” in the “Brookian ZOI” was perforated and flow tested at 80-100 barrels of oil per day, yielding light oil (40 degree API).
“Such flow rates are considered to be an excellent result and indicate the potential for materially higher flow rates when wells are drilled in the typical manner for Brookian wells in Alaska - horizontally, stimulated and with larger intervals perforated,” Pantheon said.
The North Slope Alkaid 1 well was drilled as a vertical test well by Great Bear in 2015 with the primary objective to obtain sufficient data to make an assessment as to the potential commerciality of the targeted horizons. The company was unable to flow test the well because of flooding on the nearby Dalton Highway and then after that former Gov. Bill Walker reneged on the state’s promise to pay exploration credits for a portion of exploratory costs - an action that hit small independents such as Great Bear particularly hard, especially with oil prices continuing to fall.
The Alkaid well was suspended in 2015 to avoid equipment being stranded at location. Pantheon said all zones had been logged and sidewall cores had been taken at the deepest zones, confirming indications of oil in three major zones, from some 4,000 feet to some 8,100 feet.
West Sak, Ugnu being tested Next, the company will isolate the Brookian ZOI zone, and flow test the shallower West Sak and Ugnu horizons prior to shutting down operations later in April.
Alkaid 1 is on a lease that is part of 10 contiguous leases west of the Dalton Highway and five leases straddling the highway; the leases are south of Prudhoe Bay, near the trans-Alaska oil pipeline corridor and southwest of two vertical wells Great Bear drilled in 2012.
Pantheon previously said it holds a 100 percent interest in the production testing operations and a 75 percent interest in the event of a plug and abandon operation, with its joint venture partner Halliburton paying the remaining 25 percent share. While Halliburton will not participate as a working interest owner in the testing, Pantheon said Halliburton has a back-in right which would allow it to buy back into its 25 percent working interest.
- KAY CASHMAN
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