Offshore staff
DUBLIN, Ireland – Providence Resources says the Dragon discovery in the St George’s Channel basin off southeast Ireland may contain more gas than previously thought.
The new assessment resulted from a seismic inversion study over the area by IKON Geoscience.
The new study involved modeling of historical well and seismic data using up-to-date technology. The results suggest that the presence of the Dragon gas-bearing reservoir sands may be directly detectable from the 3D seismic data.
Revised mapping using these inverted seismic data indicates that the gas accumulation may extend further into Irish waters than had been previously been mapped, with potential resources of up to 300 bcf and a 75:25 resource split between Ireland and the UK.
Providence has started additional reprocessing of the 3D seismic data ahead of a planned appraisal well in 2012.
The Dragon structure is partly in Providence’s Irish Standard Exploration License (SEL) 1/07, in around 100 m (328 ft) of water, and 40 km (24.8 mi) from Ireland.
It extends across the median line into UK block 103/1, off western Wales, where Marathon Oil drilled the 103/1-1 discovery well in 1994. Providence has also applied to operate this block under the UK Government’s recent “out of round” process.
Previous analysis has assessed Dragon’s in-place resources at up to 100 bcf, split 25:75 between Ireland and the UK.
10/07/2011
