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(Alliance News) - UK Oil & Gas PLC said Friday the conventional coring programme at the HH2 Portland pilot well at the Horse Hill oil field in Surrey has started.
Alba Mineral Resources PLC noted the announcement.
UKOG holds a controlling 86% interest in the Horse Hill oil field and surrounding licences. Alba Mineral Resources, a mineral exploration firm, holds a 12% interest.
UKOG said a 60 foot core, drilled to a depth of 2,049 feet, successfully landed Friday morning and is being prepared for analysis at a Surrey-based laboratory.
The oil company said it is increasing its coring programme to four core holes from three, which will cover the full Portland reservoir.
"Operations to cut core 2 are in progress and the full programme is expected to be completed next week," the company added.
UKOG continued: "The additional 60 ft core 4 is in response to the receipt of a revised HH-1 petrophysical interpretation from Petroscale in Houston, Texas, which indicates that the field's oil water contact may be significantly deeper than previously recognised."
If the interpretation is correct, the deeper oil water contact could "potentially significantly" increase the field's recoverable oil volumes, UKOG said.
"Core 4 is purposefully designed to provide the necessary data to help confirm the possible deeper oil water contact," UKOG said.
After the coring programme is completed, the well will be drilled to just over 2,300 feet.
UKOG Chief Executive Stephen Sanderson said: "The HH-2 coring programme, a key step towards delivering the correct placement of HH-2z's horizontal section within the field's most oil productive interval, now also has the welcome task of helping confirm a deeper oil water contact. If correct, the deeper contact will have a potentially significant positive impact upon oil in place and recoverable volumes, a welcome development."
The Horse Hill-2 well is one of two new horizontal wells in the field's Portland oil section. UK Oil added that the well is to be "retained as a future production well", with flow rates estimated to be significantly higher than the 362 barrels of oil per day expected from the Horse Hill-1 vertical Portland discovery well.
Shares in UK Oil & Gas were 0.5% higher in London on Friday at 1.08 pence each. Alba Mineral Resources was 1.6% higher at 0.19p each.
By Paul McGowan; paulmcgowan@alliancenews.com
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