Swedish Oil Firm Resumes Drilling in South Sudan

Text of report in English by Paris-based Sudanese newspaper Sudan Tribune website on 13 February

[Unattributed report: "Swedish Lundin Petroleum Starts Work in Sudan Block 5B"]

Swedish Lundin Petroleum AB has started drilling operations in Block 5B, the oil firm announced today.

The exploration well Nyal-1, located on the western flank of the basin was spudded on Thursday, 7 February 2008. The well is located in the "dry land" area of the block where several prospects have been identified as a result of the recently acquired 2D seismic programme.

The exploration well Nyal-1, with a planned depth of 2,100 metres, will target the Upper to Lower Cretaceous sandstone reservoirs that have proved highly productive in other producing fields in the Muglad Basin. The gross unrisked recoverable prospective resource for the Nyal prospect is estimated at 176 million barrels of oil (mmbo).

In parallel, preparations for the start of the "swamp" area drilling campaign with the first exploration well Wan Machar-1 (previously Umm Dandalo) are ongoing.

Following accusations by HRW [Human Rights Watch] of fuelling fighting in southern Sudan, at the end of November 2003, the Swedish oil company sold most of its oil interests in Sudan to Petronas, a Malaysian state-owned company, in June 2003.

Rights to the concession of Block 5B were awarded under an Exploration & Production Sharing Agreement signed on 2 May 2001, to a consortium composed of Petronas Carigali White Nile (5B) Ltd (39 per cent), Lundin Petroleum AB (Lundin Block 5B BV) (24,5 per cent), ONGC Videsh Ltd (23,5 per cent) and Sudapet Ltd (13 per cent).

Furthermore, the partnership has accepted the recommendation of the National Petroleum Commission to assign a 10 per cent share to the Southern Sudan Oil Company to be allocated on a "pro rata" basis from each of the partners' shares.

The Block is operated by WNPOC [White Nile (5B) Petroleum Operating Company Ltd], a joint operating company between PETRONAS and Sudapet on behalf of the consortium members.

Block 5B is located in the Muglad Basin and covers an area of 20,119 square kilometres. Muglad is the main oil-producing basin in Sudan and has seen the development of several large oilfields over the past few years. So far the consortium has been active in reprocessing and reinterpreting existing seismic data.

Originally published by Sudan Tribune website, Paris in English 13 Feb 08.

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Source: BBC Monitoring Middle East