Tullow Oil discovers oil in Ghana

6th Jun 2011 07:25

Oil giant Tullow Oil reported an "encouraging first step" in drilling on Monday after its Banda-1 exploration well offshore Ghana discovered oil, albeit at a poor quality.The well, located in the West Cape Three Points licence (in which Tullow holds a 22.9% interest), has encountered Ceonmanian turbidites over a gross vertical interval of 300m, "containing over 100m of low porosity sandstone and 3m of approximately 40 degree API oil pay," the firm said."Banda-1 was our first wildcat designed specifically to investigate the potential of Cenomanian age reservoirs in West Cape Three Points. Finding some light oil in such a thick sandstone package is an encouraging first step, however the reservoir is poor quality at this location," said exploration director Angus McCoss.The group also revealed that its Jobi-East-1 and Mpyo-3 wells in Exploration Area 1 (EA1) onshore Uganda have both encountered oil in line with initial expectations."These wells have successfully calibrated large seismic and gravity data anomalies, which have now been proven as oil accumulations."Subject to the completion of the farm-down, Tullow will have a 33.3% interest in the EA1 licence."The Jobi-East-1 and Mpyo-3 well results mark an excellent start to this next phase of our exploration and appraisal campaign in the Lake Albert Rift Basin. We look forward to many more exciting wells as we endeavour to determine the total oil resource base which will underpin the basin-wide development preparations currently in progress," McCoss said.---BC