Baku, Azerbaijan, Mar.19
By Maksim Tsurkov - Trend:
The company SOCAR (State Oil Company of Azerbaijan) on Mar.19 started drilling the third well on the gas field Umid in the Caspian Sea, the first vice president of SOCAR Khoshbakht Yusifzade told reporters.
"Drilling of a new well of the inclined type begins today," he said. "The design depth of the well is 1,500 meters."
Earlier, Yusifzade said that SOCAR will be able to estimate the reserves at this site, and if they are sufficient, a new platform will be established there.
At the same time a tender to determine a foreign partner to develop the Umid field will be conducted. The costs of SOCAR for drilling will be taken into account during the conclusion of the contract.
SOCAR reported the discovery of the Umid field in 2010. The results of drilling of the first exploration well show that the amount of the reserves of the field is more than 200 billion cubic meters of gas and 40 million metric tons of condensate, according to SOCAR assessments.
Daily debit of two wells in the Umid field ranges within 1.1-1.5 million cubic meters of gas.
The Umid field is located 75 kilometers from Baku and 40 kilometers from the coast. The first geophysical works were carried out here in 1953. These works were repeated in some improved form in 1972. Nine wells were drilled here between 1977 and 1992 but none of them gave any results.
Follow the author on Twitter: @MaksimTsurkov