Neil Ritchie, New Zealand
Friday, 15 January 2010
CANADA-listed junior TAG Oil is about to kick off its 2010 New Zealand exploration program with the drilling of up to three shallow stratigraphic core wells to further investigate the historic East Coast Basin Waitangi Hill oil seeps. “We are just waiting on the weather and expect to spud the first well during the weekend. We plan to drill and core continuously down to a depth of about 250 metres,” company chief operating officer Drew Cadenhead told PetroleumNews.net in New Plymouth this morning.
While the discovery well was being drilled in 1912 there had been reported production of up to 50 barrels per day of high-quality (50 API) crude oil from a depth of about 200m at Waitangi Hill, north of the Poverty Bay town of Gisborne, he added.
TAG has said its Waitangi appraisal was part of an extensive program planned for its three onshore East Coast Basin leases – PEP 38348 (Waitangi), PEP 38349 (Boar Hill) and PEP 50940 (Nicks Head).
Cadenhead added the government’s Crown Minerals Group earlier this week granted TAG a 250.5 square kilometre extension to the more southern lease PEP 38349 to enable TAG to include all of a “rather large, fairly significant conventional prospect” that extended outside the permit.
He said the Kawakawa prospect, an anticlinal structure identified by 2D seismic shot during 2008, was one of the more prominent, high-impact targets identified in the licence that also included the Boar Hill, Pauariki, and the Arakihi prospects.
TAG was keen to work explore the Kawakawa as there were existing oil and gas seeps near the Owahanga River.
He added that planning was underway for the main Boar Hill-1 well, east of Dannevirke, to fully penetrate the underlying Waipawa Black Shale and Whangai Formation fractured oil-shale source-rocks at an anticipated depth of 1600m.
Meanwhile, exploration minnow Widespread Energy is planning to next month drill a stratigraphic bore near the Kotuku oil seeps in its 100%-held licence PEP 38526 – one of two leases held on the South Island’s West Coast.
Nelson-based Widespread intends drilling down to about 250m to confirm the shape of the Kotuku anticline, and recover samples of the rock strata and the nature of any fluids contained within it.
The venture capital investor is also involved in onshore Taranaki licence PEP 51150 through its 11.8% stake in affiliated private company Green Gate, and the Christchurch-based company is planning to drill its first well in the lease during the second quarter of this year. |