Houston American Energy Corp. announces the acquisition, effective October 31, 2019, of a membership interest in Hupecol Meta, LLC which owns the CPO-11 block in the Llanos Basin in Colombia. The 639,405 gross acre CPO-11 block is comprised of the 69,128 acre Venus Exploration area, operated by Hupecol Operating Co. LLC, and 570,277 acres which was 50% farmed out to Parex Resources by Hupecol. Through its membership interest, Houston American holds a 1% interest in the Venus Exploration area and a 0.5% interest in the remainder of the block.

Hupecol has advised that it plans to commence drilling in the Venus Exploration area beginning with the Venus-1 horizontal well in December 2019.  Pursuant to the farm-out agreement covering the balance of the CPO-11 block, the Daisy-1 vertical well is planned for drilling in November 2019 followed by the Montuno-1 planned for drilling, at no cost to Houston American, in February 2020, with additional wells potentially being drilled during 2020 based on initial drilling results. 

The CPO-11 covers almost 1000 square miles with multiple identified leads and prospects expected to support a multi-well drilling program. The Venus Exploration area includes an existing productive vertical well that is presently shut-in. Based on analogies to the adjacent Rubiales field and in order to optimize expected resource recovery and well economics, the Venue-1 well, and future wells in the Venus Exploration area, are presently planned as horizontal wells. 

Jim Schoonover, CEO of Houston American Energy, stated, 
"We are excited to resume our operations in Colombia alongside our historic partner, Hupecol, and Parex, a leading operator in Colombia.  In addition to participation in a potential large scale drilling and development program represented by CPO-11, we expect that resumption of our investment alongside Hupecol and investing alongside Parex will offer the potential to further expand our footprint in Colombia."

The addition of CPO-11 compliments our recent efforts to expand our acreage position which, over the last year, has resulted in the acquisition of positions in two blocks in the Midland sub-basin of the Permian Basin totaling approximately 6,500 gross acres plus the 639,000+ gross acre CPO-11 block. Together, we expect those acquisitions to provide a multi-year inventory of drilling prospects with the potential return to growth in production, proved reserves, revenues and a potential return to profitability."

Link to Houston American Energy Colombia country profile