From Australia (RW): Apache’s oil find at Phoenix South-1 (SEN, 31/11) in the Canning Basin, off Western Australia, is potentially the largest here in the last 30 years.
Apache has estimated oil-in-place could be up to 300 MMbbls and said it is a commercial discovery, but has refrained so far in giving a likely recoverable reserves figure. Not so resource analysts who believe the recoverable reserve figure could be 60-90 MMbbls.
Phoenix South-1 is in a permit 180 km north of Port Hedland in 133 m. It lies 13.5 km from BP’s original 1980 Phoenix-1 discovery. That well was plagued with technical troubles and was never fully evaluated.
However BP was sufficiently encouraged to drill Phoenix-2 in 1982. The second well also found oil, but the Triassic-age reservoir sands were not good quality and BP’s campaign was terminated. The company had identified the Phoenix South prospect, but it was outside BP’s acreage.
Phoenix South-1 has intersected the same stratigraphic intervals as the BP wells. Based on measured permeability in Phoenix South there is a possibility that the old BP wells could have been a commercial oil find that was misdiagnosed.
Apache intends to review the old well logs for BP’s 1980s campaign to ‘back-solve’ it with
the new well.
Low threshold
In any event, the relatively shallow water at Phoenix South puts a minimum threshold for viable development at around 15-20mmbbls and supports Apache’s declaration of a likely commercial find, although appraisal drilling will be needed to confirm this diagnosis.
The discovery has also upgraded the potential of adjacent permits with Apache immediately committing to drill the neighboring Roc prospect next year and exercising options to acquire a 40% interest in two other permits.