Savannah Petroleum PLC provides an update on its operations in Niger, ahead of the commencement of its three well drilling campaign on the R3 portion of the R3/R4 PSC Area in the Agadem Basin, south east Niger.

The construction of the Bushiya well pad, the first well in the Company’s campaign, has been completed. The well site is now fully manned and operational, with over 100 personnel on site, including Great Wall Drilling Company Niger SARL rig crew and Savannah drilling supervisors.

Rig GWDC 215 is on location at Bushiya, with preparations for spud underway. Drilling continues to be on track to commence by the end of March 2018. 

In preparation for the rest of the drilling campaign, well pad construction for the second well, Amdigh, is over twenty per cent. progressed. Civil work operations at the site are expected to be complete by the end of March 2018, at which point the Company’s contractors will commence work at the Kunama site. 

Drilling Campaign
As previously announced, Savannah’s drilling campaign is intended to target three prospects on the R3 portion of the R3/R4 PSC Area: Bushiya, Amdigh and Kunama (all defined on 3D seismic).

Savannah’s competent person, CGG Robertson (“CGG”), has assessed total mean unrisked recoverable resources across the three targets at 110 mmbbls (a simple arithmetic sum of the three targets). Each well is designed to evaluate potential oil pay in the Eocene Sokor Alternances as the primary target, with the secondary target of potential oil pay in the Eocene-Oligocene Upper Sokor being considered as upside.

Each prospect is anticipated to take c.30-35 days to drill, and there will be a rig move of c.10-15 days between each well. Throughout the drilling, the Company plans to log prospective sections, with further logging as required for hydrocarbon bearing sections. Wells will be suspended in the success case for reentry and further evaluation, which would include well testing and completion using a smaller, cheaper and dedicated testing or workover rig.

Andrew Knott, CEO of Savannah Petroleum, said:
“We are delighted to be on the cusp of commencing our maiden drilling operations in Niger, which represents the culmination of thousands of man-hours of technical and operational work. The drilling campaign has the potential to be transformational for both Savannah and the local communities in which we are operating. I look forward to sharing further news and updates on this campaign as we move into an operationally busy period for our Company.”