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China – Beibu Gulf Block 22/12


 
HISTORY
  • ROC farmed into the offshore block in 2002 taking a 25% interest.  Within the month of the farm-in the first well was drilled and discovered the Wei 6-12 oil field.  ROC structured the farm-in as a one well option, which it duly exercised after the discovery, acquiring the operatorship and increasing its equity to 40% via a further farm-in.
  • In 2004, ROC drilled an appraisal well on the Wei 12-8 East oil field which successfully confirmed the presence of oil but also indicated that the oil was viscous so commercial development would not be straightforward. 
  • In April / May 2006, ROC drilled the Wei 6-12S-1 exploration well and made a potentially significant oil discovery.
  • Block 22/12 also contains four undeveloped oil accumulations discovered by previous operators.
REGIONAL ACTIVITY
  • The Block is in an area of known oil fields.  The nearest producing field is Wei 12-1 (production from Weizhou Formation), 1,800m from the block boundary.
  • The Wei 12-1 field includes a well which yielded one of the highest oil flows encountered anywhere in China:  34,000 BOPD.
GEOLOGY
  • Reservoirs range from Eocene-aged fluvial-lacustrine sandstones of the Luishagang Formation, to Miocene-aged Jiaowei shallow marine sandstones, and the Oligocene-aged Weizhou sandstones.
  • Oil quality varies - light to heavy quality, low to medium viscosity. Some waxy crude.
PERMIT SIZE
  • 364km2
JV PARTICIPANTS AND INTERESTS
Roc Oil (China) Company (Operator) 40.0%
Horizon Oil (Beibu) Limited 30.0%
Petsec Petroleum Inc. 25.0%
Oil Australia Pty Ltd 5.0%

 * The Government has a back-in entitlement of up to 51% equity in field development.

 

ACTIVITY STATUS
Exploration and Appraisal

Since 2002 ROC has drilled six exploration wells in the Block, the first of which, Wei 6-12-1, was a small but potentially commercial oil discovery.  In 2006, Wei 6-12S-1 made a potentially significant oil discovery.  Four appraisal wells have also been drilled in the Block. 

In 2006, Wei 6-12S-1 drilled approximately 95m of net hydrocarbon pay, mainly oil, with good reservoir characteristics.  Testing of three separate zones resulted in a total collective stabilised flow rate of 5,750 BOPD.  An appraisal sidetrack, drilled and cored close to the discovery well, displayed similar reservoir quality to the discovery well.  A second sidetrack well was drilled, designed to intersect all the reservoir intervals seen in the upper part of the original discovery well downdip from that well.  The well intersected 16m net oil pay over four sands, two of which were not present in the discovery well.

There are six undeveloped oil accumulations in the Block:  Wei 12-8 East, Wei 12-8 West, Wei 12-2, Wei 12-3, Wei 6-12 and Wei 6-12 South.

 

Appraisal / Development

On 27 September 2008, CNOOC confirmed that the Wei 6-12, Wei 6-12S and Wei 12-8 Oil Fields have been declared development areas.

Work is in progress on the preparation of an Overall Development Plan for the Wei 12-8 West, Wei 6-12 South and Wei 6-12 oil fields, planned to be submitted in 4Q 2008 or early 2009 for Chinese Government approval.