GAC Shipping

Subsea infrastructure services provider N-Sea Offshore has appointed GAC Shipping as its ship agent for supporting vessels for its oil and gas and renewable energy projects in the North Sea.

Under the deal GAC will provide a number of support services for vessels chartered by N-Sea calling at UK ports.

The first vessel to be handled under the agreement is scheduled to be a construction vessel calling at Montrose in early April.

Petrobras

Petrobras has discovered a 188m hydrocarbon column during its drilling of its wildcat well 1-BRSA-1205-RNS in the Potiguar Basin, Brazil.

The well was completed after reaching a total depth of 5353m and underwent a formation test, confirming the reservoir's satisfactory porosity and permeability.

Based on the results obtained from the well, exploratory activities will continue, with a view to proposing a discovery evaluation plan to Brazil's National Petroleum, Natural Gas and Biofuels Agency.

Torrens Energy

Torrens Energy has advised that its voting power in Phoenix Oil and Gas has risen above 25%.

Torrens made an all-scrip off-market takeover offer to acquire all of Phoenix's fully paid shares on the basis of one Torrens share for one Phoenix share in February.

The friendly merger will result in the combined companies going by the name High Peak Royalties.

AWE

Pateke-4H well operator AWE is preparing to sidetrack the well in New Zealand's Taranaki Basin after it failed to resolve mechanical drill string difficulties in the original well.

The sidetrack will be drilled to approximately 4110m below rotary table before drilling horizontally for a further 1250m.

It will aim for the Kapuni F10 sandstone objective, which was intersected on prognosis in the original hole with oil shows and real-time logging measurements indicating the likely presence of an oil-bearing reservoir.

The commercial significance of the discovery will not be known until the horizontal drilling is complete.