LONDON (Alliance News) - RusPetro PLC Monday said it has completed its development well campaign in the area of Pad 23b on the Pottymsko-Inginsky licence block in western Siberia and said production has continued to increase throughout 2015.
The company said average monthly production in April and May increased to 5,325 barrels of oil per day from 3,262 barrels per day, and by the end of May, production had reached 6,100 barrels of oil per day.
The drilling campaign that has now been completed consisted of two multi-stage fractured horizontal wells and one deviated well.
"The horizontal well programme implemented over the last year has moved the group up a very steep learning curve with regard to the future development of our assets," it said in a statement. "New technology implementation has been aggressive, aided by risk-based decision making and extensive scenario-planning."
"The group has also delivered breakthrough reductions in well cost while drilling longer horizontal reservoir sections," it added. RusPetro said the most recent horizontal well was drilled for USD5.4 million in total.
The focus for the second half of 2015 will be on appraising the wider license area with a mixture of vertical and horizontal appraisal wells, designed to mature a portfolio of horizontal development wells to be drilled in 2016 and 2017. This development programme is expected to underpin the next significant step up in production.
Of the USD94.7 million in development and working capital facilities from Bank Otkritie Financial Corp, RusPetro has drawn down USD28.2 million, and said its cash balance was around USD17 million at the end of May.
RusPetro shares were untraded on Monday morning, last trading at 10.00 pence per share.
By Joshua Warner; joshuawarner@alliancenews.com; @JoshAlliance
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