ONGC plans to drill its first shale gas well RNSG-1 to a depth of 2,000 meters and will assess the shale gas potential of about 700 meters thick shale which is about 250 to 300 million years old. The pilot project in Durgapur is being conducted by Schlumberger and ONGC expects results of the well by the end of October.
"Based on gas content measurements in major shale sequences, geochemical parameters, logistics and depth considerations, Damodar and Cambay basins were identified as priority areas," ONGC said.
ONGC plans to drill three more wells in Damodar Valley along the Bihar-West Bengal border by the end of 2012 as part of its research and development efforts.
In the same statement, ONGC said it has also found oil in the Cambay basin in western India and encountered gas in the Krishna Godavari Basin in the southeastern state of Andhra Pradesh.
The Limbodra East-1 well in Cambay basin was drilled to a depth of 680 meters and the well encountered 11 meters of gross pay of late Eocene age of Tarapur formation and flowed oil on testing, it said.
The company added that it found gas at Vygreswaram Southwest-1 onshore the KG basin. The well drilled to a depth of 4,600 meters produced gas at a rate of 75,000 cu m/d and condensate at 3.0 cu m/d.
"Our recent exploratory successes are the result of a two pronged strategy of targeting deeper as well as shallower targets in operational areas in different basins. This strategy has given rich dividends in the form of discoveries made," ONGC said.
China Chemical Weekly: http://news.chemnet.com/en/detail-1411716.html
