Rig arrives on site to drill Byron’s Gulf of Mexico well

The Enterprise Offshore Drilling 264 (EOD 264) drilling rig has arrived on location to drill the SM71 F4 well from Byron Energy’s SM71 F platform located in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico.

Byron said on Tuesday that the rig arrived on Saturday, January 25, and was jacked up to working height with equipment loading underway.

The arrival of the rig was deferred last week due to bad weather conditions in the Gulf of Mexico.

Current operations are driving a 24-inch drive pipe to proper depth before rigging up diverter lines and other equipment in preparation of spudding the well.

The SM71 F4 well is designed to test an Upper D5 Sand seismic event outboard of the primary D5 producing area where the SM71 F1 and F3 wells have been in production since March of 2018. Drilling of the SM71 F5 well will be contingent on the results of the SM71 F4 well.

The well will be drilled to a depth of 8,180 measured depth (7,615 true vertical depth) and is expected to take 25 days to drill and evaluate.

Byron is the operator of SM71 and currently has a 50 percent working interest. Otto Energy holds the remaining interest in SM71. It is worth stating that Otto elected not to participate in the SM71 F4 well, giving Byron a 100 percent working interest in the well.

Over the past twelve months, SM71 ranked fourth in total oil production amongst all producing leases on the Gulf of Mexico shelf in water depths up to 400 feet.

On January 23, production from the D5 Sand surpassed 2 million barrels of oil and 2.8 billion cubic feet of natural gas in less than two years with no formation water observed to date.

Byron also said that the construction work on the future SM58 G platform is ongoing in Abbeville, Louisiana, and it remains on schedule for installation in June 2020.

Structural work to the jacket portion of the platform is in progress and painting and coating of the deck portion is complete. The next construction phase will focus on interconnect piping. All production equipment is being refurbished and will be reinstalled along with instrumentation and electrical work over the next three months.

When completed and installed, the SM58 G platform will be capable of handling 8,000 barrels of oil per day, 80 million cubic feet of natural gas per day, and 8,000 barrels of water per day.

Byron holds all the operator’s rights, title, and interest in and to the SM58 Lease Block to a depth of 13,639 feet subsea with a 100 percent working interest.

2020 drilling program

Byron said that it executed a drilling contract with Enterprise Offshore Drilling to utilize the EOD 264 jack-up rig to drill four new wells and complete all successful wells during the program. The contract calls for the EOD 264 to be released to Byron after May 15, 2020, subject to its availability.

The initial well to be drilled under the contract will be the SM69 E2 which will be drilled from the SM69 E Platform. If the well is successful, first production from the well is expected within three to six months after completion.

The focus of the second phase of the drilling program will be the SM58 lease where three new wells will be drilled from the SM58 G Platform once it is set.

Initial operations will be to complete the G1 before starting work on new wells, the first of which will be the SM58 G2.

Byron’s CEO, Maynard Smith, stated: “I am very pleased that we have begun the first leg of our 2020 program by initiating work on the SM71 F4 well. This well will be the first well in the program and, if successful, the F4 will provide Byron with an important step up in daily oil production.

“The on-schedule progress of construction work on the SM58 G Platform is a testament to our staff in Lafayette and now that we have secured a quality drilling rig, we can look forward to executing the upcoming drilling program.

“The platform construction and the drilling program has been made possible by the funding that was put in place at the end of 2019 coupled with the steady cash flow from SM71, both of which allow Byron to continue the transformational growth brought on by the SM58 discovery made last year. We intend to be in a continual drilling and completion program from May through the end of the year.”