Stena drillship arrives in Peru ahead of Karoon well

Australia’s Karoon Energy has said that the Stena Forth drillship has arrived in the Port of Callao Lima Peru ahead of drilling the Marina-1 exploration well located in Block Z-38 Tumbes Basin, Peru.

Karoon executed binding agreements with drilling contractor Stena Drilling and oil company Tullow Oil to contract the Stena Forth drillship for Karoon’s Marina-1 well in November 2019. The drillship assignment agreement provided Karoon with a single well slot from the existing rig contract between Tullow and Stena. The drillship has already drilled two wells for Tullow offshore Guyana.

Karoon is the operator and has a 40% net interest in Block Z-38. The company said in an update on Thursday that the Stena Forth would remain at the Port of Callao for one to two weeks to refuel and change the crew before continuing on to the Marina-1 well location.

“Karoon expects the vessel to clear customs and final permits to be received over the coming weeks. The well is expected to spud during the last week of January 2020,” the company said.

The Marina prospect has a gross prospective resource best estimate of 256 million barrels of oil (net to Karoon 102 million barrels).

The Marina prospect comprises a large fault-bounded structure with targets at multiple levels from 900m subsea to 2900m. The targets are in the Tertiary Pliocene La Cruz to Cardalitos formations.

According to Karoon, the structures are well defined by 3D seismic. Nearby hydrocarbon seeps demonstrate that migrating hydrocarbons are present, supported by seismic AVO anomalies indicative of trapped oil at Marina, Karoon said.

Karoon’s wholly-owned subsidiary, KEI (Peru Z-38) Sucursal del Peru, owns a 40% operating equity interest in the Blocks with Tullow Oil holding 35% and Pitkin Petroleum holding the remaining 25% equity interest.

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