Westmount Energy, the UK investment firm focused on the Guyana-Suriname Basin, announced this morning that the Tanager-1 well that was being drilled by ExxonMobil in the Kaieteur block has been reported as an oil discovery but the amount found is considered to be non-commercial as a stand-alone development.
The Tanager-1 exploration well is the deepest well drilled in the Guyana-Suriname Basin to date. It was spudded on the 11th of August 2020, using the Stena Carron drillship, and reached a total depth of 7,633 metres in recent days. Westmount noted that the evaluation wireline logging and sampling data confirm 16 metres of net oil pay in high-quality sandstone reservoirs of Maastrichtian age. Furthermore, Westmount said that preliminary evaluation of the fluid samples from the Maastrichtian reservoir indicates heavier oil than is reported from the Liza Phase One producing field crude assays. The company said that these samples will be the subject of further detailed laboratory analysis over the coming months.
Although high quality reservoirs were also encountered at the deeper Santonian and Turonian intervals, Guyana Standard understands that interpretation of the reservoir fluids is reported to be equivocal at this stage and requires further analysis. It is anticipated that the well will now be plugged and abandoned in the coming days.
The Kaieteur Block is currently operated by an ExxonMobil subsidiary, Esso Production & Exploration Guyana Limited (35%), with Cataleya Energy Limited (“CEL”) (25%), Ratio Guyana Limited (“RGL”) (25%) and a subsidiary of Hess Corporation (15%) as partners.
Westmount holds approximately 5.4% of the issued share capital of Cataleya Energy Corporation, the parent company of CEL and 0.7% of the issued share capital of Ratio Petroleum Energy Limited Partnership the ultimate holding entity with respect to Ratio Guyana Limited.
Since the announcement of the news this morning, Ratio’s share capital dropped by more than 50 percent.
