However, STOS has not yet revealed any gas and condensate flow rates for the onshore-offshore well, from which initial results sparked a reserves downgrade earlier this year.
STOS says that during last week its Pohokura South-1B crew has modified flare silencers to minimise smoke emissions and conducted downhole production logging with the well flowing. After additional smoke minimisations, temperature and pressure gauges were run downhole. The well was then opened for a seven-day flow period, which was due to finish Sunday night.
The projected program until this Thursday includes closing the well in for a three-day pressure build-up, retrieving and then rerunning the temperature and pressure gauges; then opening the well up for the main 14-day test.
The deviated well was drilled onshore from the Methanex Motunui methanol plant last year, but deviated approximately 3.7km offshore to test the southern limits of the possible -1tcf field.
Todd Energy chief executive Richard Tweedie told EnergyReview.Net in January that initial results, coupled with the tight rock characteristics near to shore, painted a picture of mid-case recoverable reserves being 500-600 bcf of gas, down from the last official Fletcher Challenge Energy estimate of 964 bcf of gas and 53 million barrels of condensate.
Shell New Zealand chairman Lloyd Taylor has also told ERN that initial results from the Pohokura South-1B well were not as good as those from Pohokura-3, which was drilled 12km offshore. He said the 'centre of gravity' of the development had moved offshore and the first gas would, in all probability, be from an offshore wellhead platform targeting the best reservoir, as seen in the Pohokura-2 and 3 wells, via pipeline to an onshore gas plant.
Taylor said first gas ashore was likely by late 2005-early 2006, given no problems with the marketing and selling of Pohokura gas by the partners, Shell, Todd Energy and OMV Petroleum.
The Commerce Commission is due to hold a three-day conference early next month on the partners' application to jointly market and sell Pohokura gas.
