nice post from amstocks worth the read
Some musings about Copper Moki and the Cheal B5 well...
The Copper Moki-1 well from New Zealand Energy (NZERF) is on a structure that is about 173 acres. The Copper Moki-1 well was 12.2 net meters (about 40 feet) of net formation in 3 sands. It flowed 1,100 barrels and 855 mcf of gas in a 24 hour test. The well also had 15 net meters of pay in the Urenui formation which appeared to be primarily gas. NZERF does not have a gas pipeline yet so are flaring the gas and will wait until later to learn if the 15 meters of Urenui can produce commercial amounts of gas.
Tag oil's B5 well also was a good well with 1,700 barrels per day of production and 1 mmcfg/d. Tag had 20 meters (about 66 feet) of continuous oil and gas pay and a total of 35 net feet of pay in the formation. This is somewhat different than what NZERF had. NZERF had 3 sands and about 40 net feet of pay. Tag has 66 feet of continuous pay and about 50 additional feet of pay in other sands. They have 114 net feet of pay in all.
The Mt. Messenger formation is mostly composed of thin bedded sandstone and siltstone separated by thin layers of shale. One of the original ideas that they had was to drill horizontals and then frac them to intercept more Mt. Messenger "lobes".
The B5 well is something different. Still in the Mt. Messenger formation but given the high porosity of up to 30% and continuous nature, they intercepted an area where during deposition some process changed the deposited formation. Instead of normal turbidite fan deposits that are covered by thin layers of shale, the Mt. Messenger at the B5 well seems much more heterogeneous. Therefore, they may have intercepted a channel - and the sediments are channel fill. Channels can vary in width and length. Channel fill deposits are more sand rich which could account for porosity of up to 30% and higher permeability.
Given the geology of the area - the Mt. Messenger formation is composed of laminated turbidites with layers of shale between the sands. The Mt. Messenger formation was deposited in relatively deep water. Therefore, the sands flowed downslope and settled forming layers of sand. This process occurred periodically due to cyclical changes in sea water depth. During times that sand was not flowing down slope, finer sediment and organic material settled out forming layers of shale. Given this type of geology, there should be channels, distributary channels, levees and etc. The cartoon showing the proposed Cheal B6 well location indicates it is close to the Cheal B3 well so is unlikely to intercept the same distributary channel (assuming there is a distributory channel). The Cheal B3 well IP'd I think at 400 boe and the last report I have in my notes is that it was producing about 330 boe. The Cheal B6 may be similar to that well. The proposed location of the Cheal B7 well is to the east so is closer but still probably not far enough to the east to intercept the distributory channel.
The Copper Moki-1 well is the first well drilled in NZERF's prospect area. The two follow on wells the Copper Moki-2 and Copper Moki-3 may not have the same kind of production that the Copper Moki-1 well had. It is hard to make any prediction based on one well. NZERF makes no prediction but does indicate that the three prospects look similar on seismic. Based on the estimates of size and production, the Copper Moki-1 well has very good porosity and permeability. This may mean that they have drilled some feature other than a laminated turbidite sheet sand prospect or it could mean that the geology is in general more favorable than where Tag Oil drilled.
Both NZERF and TAG have found very good wells and may have the opportunity to repeat the success with additional wells. But it is unclear to me if either company will be able to repeat the success with the next immediately planned wells. I'm most unclear about NZERF as the Copper Moki-1 was their first well. The location is far enough away from Tag Oils wells that they may get different results than did Tag Oil on their leases.
The Tag Oil B5 well might have intercepted a channel fill or other feature that has higher than normal sand content and fewer laminations. If so, determining the actual feature and boundaries of it should allow them to drill other similar wells. From the seismic data on the cartoons - they generally show a seismic line cutting generally from East to West or WNW to ESE as in NZERF''s presentation page 11. During deposition, the sands were moving generally to the NW or WNW into deeper water. Therefore, features like channels that also tend to go NW or WNW would be parallel to the seismic diagrams given on the presentations and therefore the feature would probably not show up.
Tag Oil indicated that the Cheal B5 well was a "Game Changer". If it is on a channel fill type feature, it may ultimately produce 5 or 10 times as much hydrocarbons as typical wells in the area. If the B5 well did encounter a channel fill type feature where I think it is, then I would expect them to drill some of the follow up wells to target the feature. They might even move the down hole location of some of the planned future wells from the location given on the cartoon.
I am very interested to see the follow up Copper Moki wells. It would be interesting to find out if NZERF's land position is as good as Tag Oils or even better.
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