Denver-based ECA, which operates as Westech Energy in New Zealand, is using the Ensign International Energy Services Rig 19 to drill the shallow well near the town of Wairoa in licence PEP 38346, which it acquired last July.
ECA business development vice president Denny McGowan said Waitahora-1 is very close to the wellsite of the Kauhauroa gas strike Westech made nine years ago and is essentially a re-test of the Kauhauroa structure.
According to Crown Minerals, the Kauhauroa-1 discovery well flowed gas from a highly over-pressured formation, the Kauhauroa limestones, an early Miocene-aged reservoir.
Westech drilled six exploration wells and five appraisal wells in the onshore East Coast Basin in the late 1990s. All wells encountered significant gas shows, with two, Kauhauroa-1 and Tuhara-1, discovering hydrocarbons in potentially commercial volumes.
In February, McGowan said Westech’s different operational focus, higher gas prices and a better understanding of the changing New Zealand gas market should improve the company’s chances of commercial success this time.
He said Westech believed there were several significant accumulations, totalling several billion cubic feet or larger, on the East Coast – accumulations that could be developed economically, given New Zealand’s increasing gas prices and the East Coast’s developing industries.
