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(Alliance News) - Zephyr Energy PLC said Wednesday its acreage in Utah's Paradox Basin, US, has been recommended by the University of Utah's Energy & Geoscience Institute and the Utah Geological Survey for the drilling of a well.
Shares in the Rocky Mountain oil and gas company were 24% higher in London on Wednesday at 0.62 pence each.
The University of Utah's Energy & Geoscience Institute and the Utah Geological Survey are looking "impactful oil production strategies in the northern Paradox Basin", particularly in the Pennsylvanian Paradox Formation's Cane Creek shale and adjacent clastic zones.
This project is sponsored by the US Department of Energy and its National Energy Technology Laboratory.
"The Zephyr location was selected for a number of reasons, including the quality of Zephyr's underlying 3D seismic data which (can be tied into the well results to build a stronger integrated predictive model) as well as a favourable surface location which will be sited on a pre-existing pad," the company said.
Zephyr expects the well will be spudded before the end of the year, with funding to come from a grant from the US DoE.
The company continued: "The spudding of this test well would provide multiple benefits to Zephyr - not only will the Company be able to utilise valuable data acquired from the test well, but Zephyr believes that data gained from the well would be highly beneficial to the Company's continuing farm-in and institutional funding discussions regarding its Paradox acreage."
Chief Executive Colin Harrington added: "I'm delighted by this development which should see the first well spudded on the company's Paradox acreage before the end of this calendar year. The spudding of this test well will be a significant milestone for Zephyr, and the data gained will be of fundamental importance as we move forward with farm-in discussions for our Paradox project."
By Paul McGowan; paulmcgowan@alliancenews.com
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