Member Info for Exploration

Riddlers

Several sources

One is Weldon Beauchamp’s paper in AAPG.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/255254766_Intracontinental_rifting_and_inversion_Missour_Basin_and_Atlas_Mountains_Morocco

Pathfinder Petroleum published a fairly comprehensive version of their CPR on their website for Tendrara before merging with Fastnet Oil and Gas in 2014. There is a summary of that CPR on Edison’s research website complete with risked prospect invetory although that is superseded by Sound’s work and new data.

Also Rabat Bouchta showed a lot about Tendrara in various conferences over the years, including RR1

Boderisimus

RR1 did penetrate a lot of TAGI sandstone. Upper TAGI is 250m thick, underlaid by 205m of basalt and then another 350m of Lower TAGI which was bottom hole formation. Using 7 percent porosity cut off net TAGI pay is 54m.

45 km to west of RR1 is OSD1 which penetrated deep into Carboniferous and found Visean source rocks which were oil prone with hydrogen indices of over 160.

Incidentally, “oil” was found in SBK1 in the dolerites below the Upper Salt. Lost circulation was also encountered in this zone suggesting extensive fracturing. A drillstem test on this zone produced water with a trace of oil which triggered all the excitement of the Lone Star story. Current thinking is that this oil is actually retrograde condensate which turned from gas to liquid when it expanded into the fractures.

Oppo

The whole UKCS sector is a ghost town mid-June with only two active exploration wells, both West of Shetlands.

No E&A activity is Central North Sea.

However, the next well in Southern North Sea is expected to be the Andromeda prospect in 43/12, immediately west of Spirit Energy’s Pegasus discovery and east of CLNR group of prospects in 43/11 and 42/15.

A positive Andromeda result would be a huge boost to CLNR.

Johnson36

There is a lot of technical + marketing stuff on BPs website.

Under its new name, BP Chargemaster will rollout ultra-fast charging infrastructure, including 150 kW chargers capable of delivering 100 miles of range in just 10 minutes.

Ddboy

Over the last 12 months Onhym has issued tenders for inspection and certification of their IDECO 1700 rig. The rig is still at Meskala.

They have also tendered for 4000m of new drill pipe and other bits and bobs like mud centrifuges.

More recently they have tendered for new parts for the BOP and so on. Example below.

http://ao.onhym.com/Documents/AO%2040-2018%20-%20CPS%20VD.pdf

One wonders why they would need a rig with 17,000 ft capacity. Perhaps they are lining up to drill on Tendrara?

Onhym has work camps and transport expertise. A domestic service industry would be good for Morocco but on other hand we need efficient and safe operations. I would be surprised if an audit qualified Onhym to IADC specifications and Saipem has already proved its capability.

Saipem have resolved their big bust up with Algeria where they were accused of overcharging and “interesting business practices”. So they are back in business in Algeria where their Morocco work is managed.

Soundingoff

Much as I would like to see even a summary of the final CPR I agree we will not see it although IIs may have reviewed under NDA.

I suppose that line of thinking also applies to the GSA and gas price formula. These details usually remain confidential too.

Ducati

See below

Onhym tendered this job couple of weeks ago. As you know their foreign investments team is snowed under with constant stream of hopeful punters visiting Rabat. Also, they had to spend a lot of time on the road to various oil and gas conferences whereas their time is better spent managing all their oil, gas, mining, wind farm and solar projects.

They are also tendering for a study on hydrogen exploration in the High Plateau are. I have asked my friends in Rabat but all are reluctant to discuss it.

ONHYM to privatise promotion of mining and oil assets

National hydrocarbons and mining office ONHYM (Office National des Hydrocarbures et des Mines) is to call in a private sector company to draw up a strategy for the promotion of its mining and oil assets. The selected consultancy will have to identify the measures necessary to make the kingdom more attractive to investors, draw up an efficient oil and mining sector promotion strategy and assist with its implementation. It will have the power to recommend the regulatory, legislative and fiscal changes needed to encourage foreign investors to explore Morocco's underground assets. ONHYM has never before called in the private sector for missions like this, which are its core activity.

IfonlyIhad

Basin modeling is a pretty inexact science but serves its purpose by calculating the amount of hydrocarbons generated exceeds the volume os reservoirs in which the oil or gas may have accumulated.

One of the drawbacks is that estimated numbers tend to be “anchored” to previous estimates. For example, ONAREP then led by Rabbah Bouchta, one of Moroccos leading petroleum geologists, teamed up with a bunch of Russian scientists in the 1980s. They calculated a maximum GOIP of 31 TCF in Tendrara area. Then 30 years later guess what, BM announces 31 TCF. Bit of a coincidence. So once you are stuck with a number it is hard to change it much.

The discussions about oil in Paleozoic in this area have been a hot topic for several years. As in many petroleum provinces the Tendrara gas and condensate may be a cocktail from different Palaoeozoic source rocks. This can be determined partly from biomarkers and partly from measuring the isotopic parameters of carbon 13. For example, Algerian oils have very light carbon13 isotopes and if Moroccan samples match then the same burial history can be inferred.

But in the end what we would like to see is a summary of the full CPR to make our own assessment of the value of the investment in Sound.

Sounding off

Do you think Schlumberger is blocking TE9 in favour of another appraisal/production well in TE5 Horst?

The GSA will be a depletion contract based on a forecast production profile but with only two wells that is a risky proposition for seller and buyer. And without Class 3 FEED costs the GSA gas price needs degree of flexibility.

I am assuming Schlumberger loan is repaid from their 27 percent NPI.

Judge-mental

Yes it is genius.

Like mobile phones - the value is in making calls, not so much in making the handsets.

Ink Jet Printers - cost next to nothing for the machine, but cost a fortune for replacement cartridges.

Razor blades - same thing

So, building a leading market share in refuelling electric vehicles looking 10 years ahead makes perfect sense, especially when drivers buy all sorts of other goods in the shop.

Daveyboy

To a certain extent that is correct. But in merit order terms it is normal to run down the heat stored in the liquid salt in the evenings and contribute to the base load of the grid until everyone is asleep. Obviously bigger liquid salt heat storage increases night time generation capacity but at a cost. In Spain and Morocco CSP plants do not replace gas, but they do bring down overall fuel costs by about 5 percent. As usual, it is an engineering compromise.

The heliostats are cleaned not by an army of window cleaners but but robot cleaners during the night.

Anyway, I’m invested in Sound based on geology and gas. I’m certainly not a “tree hugger” although sometimes it pays to recognize a threat to oil and gas.

Thanks Shaungreen

I said CSP technology enables power generation 24 hours per day.

Which it does.

Suggest you put another lump of coal in your boiler before using you horseless carriage to go to the shops.

Shaungreen47

Thanks for the mention. Remember that Moroccan solar plants use CSP technology which enables power generation 24 hours per day.

JPrules

There is no doubt the Shell Repsol duo are focussed on this area. Back in 2014 they won the boughezoul block in Algeria. Repsol is operator and the area is crossed by the gas pipeline from Hassi R'Mel to the Medgaz pipeline to Spain. There were only two bids for boughezoul, the other being from ENI. Anyway boughezoul is located on Algerias Hautes Plains which is the geological equivalent of Moroccos High Plateau, except the prospective area is about 10 times bigger in Algeria. It is genuine frontier exploration, completely unexplored compared to the Sahara Platform to the south. Repsol and Shell took the area around Tendrara in September 2015 whereas Sound signed up in May 2015.

Repsol and Shell appear to be taking a much wider view aiming to explore and develop the whole High Plateau area over a long period which is what majors need to supply their voracious appetites for more production. Sound would make a good start.

rizalino on your fault seal question in 2248, the quality of the seal mentioned depends on the net to gross sand to shale content of the Scremerston Sandstone. Nearby wells show this is less than 50 percent and therefore there is a good lateral seal 2252 has three gas discoveries mainly in fractured Zechstein carbonates and also in deeper Carboniferous sands. Another exciting play to be exploited with horizontal wells I suspect most posters have you filtered, so please carry on wasting your time because I'll put you back on filter immediately.

a1m1 Thanks. CLNR core area has been explored for nearly 50 years so there is plenty of open source information to understand it. The early wells found gas in the Bunter sandstone and next stage of drilling explored deeper Rotliegendes sands. But it is only in the last 15 years that deeper drilling has started to explore the deeper Carboniferous reservoirs aided by much better seismic. So CLNR is effectively chasing a new geological play and deserves to find the "cream of the crop". Small fields are now economic too. The Breagh Gasfield is "only" 600 bcf and Sterling Resources demonstrated how offshore multi-stage fracking could improve productivity per well by an order of magnitude. So a field can be developed using fewer wells. Also, the whole area is plastered with high quality, legacy 3D seismic which was acquired in previous years. The water is relatively shallow and "off the shelf" wellhead towers, subsea wells or small unmanned platforms reduce capital and operating costs. I imagine that if my hypothesis is correct none of the operators will be able to discuss it because they will be bound by confidentiality agreements. In investment terms its still a good punt for private investors and the forward potential and low technical risk make it relatively attractive - at least in the Q42 and Q43 core area. Of course, i could be wrong!

DG I think we have to take a wider view on CLNRs potential. Centrica – now Spirit Energy – has dominated this part of Quad 42 and 43 for many years. CLNR entered the area in the 29th Round on a hunch that a deeper Carboniferous source rock was active. Up to then Operators thought shallower Westphalian coal was the source of the gas. Meanwhile centrica were concentrating on the huge Cygnus Project rather than exploration. Encouragement for CLNRs theory came from the Pegasus discovery drilled by Centrica in 2016. A pattern emerged of a Carboniferous rift basin with deep, oil prone source rocks of similar age to the oil shales in the Midland Valley which were retorted in the 1850s to make kerosene lamp oil in the early Scottish oil industry. In CLNRs area deeper burial caused oil to crack into gas with condensate. This idea is supported by the “wet” gas found in the Breagh and Crosgan areas. Centrica appear to have missed this or perhaps had their exploration budget chopped before they could advance it. Important today is the idea that separate compartments of gas in undeveloped near-by discoveries and undrilled prospects could become a major new gathering hub in this part of the Southern North Sea. Early development of these resources might be possible using one of many third party gas pipeline systems in the area. It offers the opportunity of phased, technically simple gas production over the next five to seven years. With OGAs support I expect CLNR and other operators will probably be working together to conjure up a plan to optimise an integrated appraisal, development and exploration approach. OGA will not wish to upset this embryonic scheme and will provide time for all commercial arrangements to be concluded. That is what I think is going on. If I am right CLNR is in a very strong position with scope to participate in the biggest gas project in UKCS for many years.

woodrow you could be right and if so that is fantastic for Sound. In Algeria the wellhead costs for nearly 100bcm/year at Hamra, Hassi R’Mel, Alrar/Stah and El Merk are all less than 90 cents per mcm. No doubt t JJ is calculating all this right now.

Tincan1995 On the GSA "price" it is a bit more complicated than an integer number of dollars per mcf. Firstly, from the producers perspective revenue at the delivery point is known as netback. The netback per mcf is determined by removing the costs of production from the average realized price resulting in a net profit per mcf amount. These costs include importing, transportation, marketing, production and refining costs, and royalty fees. So for early years the financing development and pipeline costs take a big share of total revenue and netback to producer is depressed. Then there are provisions for currency conversion, inflation and so on. The functional currency for the project is US dollars but it is reasonable to expect sales price in Moroccan currency. The price formula may include factors to reset the price on January 1 every year taking exchange rates into account. This is how domestic sales in Algeria and Tunisia are priced. The backup could be price reopener clauses. Then there is arbitration. the recent Algeria Spain gas deal was the result of the buyers taking Algeria to Arbitration some years ago. It is mind numbing stuff, but worth billions of dollars. One of JJ tasks is to convert all this into a simple dollars per mcf figure which we can all understand and relate to share price.

Egg I suspect UK IIs have already formed a view on Sound value but without a gas price formula it is a big unknown. Meanwhile the tribes of northern Morocco are on the warpath again. These guys fought the Spanish in the Rif Wars of the 1920s and they really do not like M6 et al who are doing very nicely thank you. It’s a mini version of the 2011 Arab Spring but this time much more subtle and elites are worried. http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/social-protest-morocco-does-mohammed-vi-have-plan-1200718518