LONDON (Alliance News) - Roxi Petroleum PLC Friday said it has removed the major part of coil tubing that had been stuck in the company's Deep Well A5 on the BNG Contract Area in Kazakhstan since December, and said it hopes it can begin the 30-day well test in March.
In December, the company said it could not begin the flow test on the well until it had removed drilling fluids in the well, which was preventing oil from flowing to the surface. However, the high pressure of the well required the company to use high density fluid, which has been "problematic" to remove.
Roxi holds a 58.4% stake in the BNG Contract Area.
Roxi decided the best way to remove the fluids was to use coil tubing equipment, but the high pressure of the well meant the coil tubing equipment became stuck 2,996 metres underground and Roxi have been trying to remove the equipment and the fluids since.
On Friday, the company said it has removed the major part of the coil tubing equipment, but said 50 metres of tubing and the drilling fluids remain in stuck in the well. The company has failed to remove this part of the equipment because it "is trapped by a metallic object believed to be dropped during the clean-up works," said the company.
Roxi plans to have removed all of the equipment in February, and said it hopes to begin the 30 day flow test on the well in March.
The company said if it can not remove the equipment in time, it will remove part of the casing at the bottom of the well at a depth of 4,073 metres, which will allow open hole testing to be conducted at a higher level than previously expected, said Roxi in a statement.
In addition, if the tubing equipment is still stuck once the 30 day flow test on the well is completed, the company, as a "last resort", will sidetrack the well but warned this would result in at least a three month delay.
""We are pleased with both the pace and results to date of the clean-up work at Deep Well A5. Based on current progress we expect the 30-day well test will now start in March," said Chairman Clive Carver.
The company is expecting to finish drilling the Deep Well 801 by the middle of April and said it will drill the Deep Well A6 once the problems with A5 have been resolved. Roxi said the costs of drilling the A6 well will be "significantly cheaper" than A5.
From the shallow play on the BNG Contract Area, Roxi said its 12 wells are currently producing 375 barrels of oil per day collectively, of which 219 barrels of oil per day are net to Roxi.
Roxi shares fell 3.9% to 9.85 pence per share on Friday morning.
By Joshua Warner; joshuawarner@alliancenews.com; @JoshAlliance
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