Eni cheers ‘excellent’ results from appraisal well off Indonesia

Italian oil and gas company Eni has successfully drilled and tested the Maha 2 appraisal well, located in West Ganal block offshore Kalimantan, in Indonesia. The field is located 16 km South-East of Jangkrik FPU, operated by Eni.

The well has been drilled to a depth of 2,970 meters in 1,115 metres water depth and encountered 43 metres of gas-bearing net sands with excellent reservoir characteristics in levels of the Pliocene Age, Eni informed in a statement on Monday.

The company also added that the production test, which was limited by surface facilities, recorded an excellent gas deliverability of the reservoir flowing at 34 mmscfd. Through the test and the coring of the reservoir important data have been collected to perform all the studies required for the preparation of a field development plan for the Maha field, where two other appraisal wells are planned to be drilled.

The development plan will most likely foresee a subsea completion and a tie-in to Jangkrik FPU. The proximity of the Maha field to the existing infrastructures will allow to maximize the synergies and reduce the time and costs of future subsea developments.

Eni is the operator of West Ganal Block through its affiliate Eni West Ganal Limited holding 40 per cent participating interest while Neptune and P.T. Pertamina Hulu West Ganal hold a 30 per cent stake each.

The successful exploration campaign conducted by Eni in the deep water of East Kalimantan has already delivered the producing projects of Jangkrik and most recently Merakes, whose production startup has been announced last April.

Merakes gas will be partially sold to the domestic market and will also contribute to the extension of the life of the Bontang LNG facility that supplies liquified natural gas to both the domestic and export markets.

Eni’s current equity production in Indonesia is approximately 80,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

Commenting on the discovery, Neptune Energy’s Managing Director for Indonesia, Eko Lumadyo, said: “Maha is an exciting development for Neptune Energy, and this latest milestone brings us a step closer to bringing the discovery into production via existing infrastructure, supporting both Indonesia’s growing domestic energy demand and its burgeoning export market.

“Indonesia is a strategically important part of Neptune’s production portfolio and our progress at Maha 2 follows the commencement of production from Merakes earlier this year, and ahead of further planned activities in other discoveries and prospects”.