Gulf Keystone starts drilling Shaikan-3

3rd Sep 2010 15:57

Gulf Keystone Petroleum, one of the biggest companies listed on AIM, has started drilling on its Shaikan-3 appraisal well.The Kurdistan-focused oil company said the shallow appraisal well is situated very close to the Shaikan-1 well, the site of last year's discovery of the giant Shaikan oil field. The company has a 75% working interest in the block. The drilling programme is designed to evaluate and test the cretaceous age intervals for producible oil volumes. Much of the cretaceous interval in Shaikan-1 could not be completely logged, tested or evaluated due to lost circulation and other drilling difficulties. A large percentage of the interval is saturated with various hydrocarbons such as tar and heavy oil, the company said. The purpose of the Shaikan-3 well is to further evaluate these hydrocarbon volumes and determine if they are capable of commercial production. Drilling and testing is expected to take two months.