Interlink prepares to test Baola-8 oil discovery
Almost a year ago to the day shares in Interlink Petroleum skyrocketed when the tiny BSE-listed oil explorer announced an oil discovery at the Baola-8 well at its 4-sq km onland Baola block in Gujarat.
Today Interlink is preparing to test the Baola-8 discovery, using a 550-hp land rig hired from Ahmedabad-based Deep Industries. Interlink is expected to move the rig to the well location sometime this month (October) and begin testing by the month-end.
Interlink is currently using the Deep rig to re-enter well Modhera-1 well at its nearby 12.7-sq km Modhera onland block, also in Gujarat. Modhera-1 is an oil discovery well drilled by ONGC in 1975 and has never produced.
But Interlink believes it holds 3.2m tonnes of 12-degree API ‘heavy oil’. “We decided to re-enter Modhera-1 and drill it to 1000 metres TD,” confirms a company source.
“We’ve cleaned up the well using ‘sucker rod oil pumps’.” Interlink expects to complete drilling and testing Modhera-1 by October 10.
After this it will move the 550-hp rig from Deep about 70-km to begin testing Baola-8. Interlink drilled Baola-8 last year using a 1000-hp land rig from Dewanchand Ramsaran.
Stock market investors went into a feeding frenzy on October 23, 2010, when Interlink announced it had discovered 12-degree API oil in the ‘Middle Eocene Oolite’ reservoir section of the ‘Kalol formation’ from 904.5 to 928 metres. At Modhera meanwhile, Interlink plans to ‘hydrofrac’ another exploration well, Modhera-2, drilled to 1918 metres TD in May using a land rig from Quippo Oil and Gas.
Interlink tested the first zone at Modhera-2 at around 1600 metres for a week in September. “Oil did not flow to surface,” we learn.
Interlink hopes to test the second zone from 1600 metres to 1900 metres by the beginning of November.