Circle Oil discovers additional oil at asset

LIMERICK-headquartered exploration firm, Circle Oil has found additional oil content at one of its chief assets in Egypt, potentially increasing the size of the overall field.

The AIM-listed company — which is focused on northern Africa and the Middle-East — said yesterday via an operating update for its entire portfolio of assets in Egypt, that an appraisal programme at its Al Ola-2 well, meant to evaluate the potential for water injection to support oil production, actually found more oil, suggesting that the well and the surrounding Al Amir field could contain significantly more oil reserves than previously thought. Combined production at Circle’s Al Amir and Geyad fields are currently running steady at around 7,800 barrels of oil per day.

Professor Chris Green — Circle’s chief executive — said he was “delighted” to report another positive drilling result from the company’s latest drilling round in Egypt.

Elsewhere, Dragon Oil — the Emirates-owned exploration company, which is registered here and has its shares listed on the ISEQ — has said that it remains confident of reaching its 10%-15% growth target for the next four years. This growth would see the company producing 100,000 barrels of oil per day by 2015. Dragon made the announcement yesterday, following a detailed review of its oil field assets. However, the company’s management said that its production targets could be exceeded if a project to inject water into the wells to enhance oil output proves successful.

Meanwhile, the wait for a resolution to Tullow Oil’s ongoing attempt to begin its farm-down process of assets it acquired in Uganda from Heritage Oil goes on.

However, it was reported yesterday that a final approval from the country’s president might be inching closer as the country’s ruling party has apparently thrown its support behind the deal.