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Gold/Mining/Energy : KOB.TO - East Lost Hills & GSJB joint venture -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dave E. who wrote (3989)	8/16/1999 4:01:00 PM
From: Salt'n'Peppa	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 15703

Dave, I like the Research Capital accounting! I am guessing that those HTP estimates of $16-$125 reflect a 2-16 TCF find. I agree that it is strange how a visible flame is required by many people to reassure them that something exists downhole. Fortunately, those of us who have drilled wells know that "no flare = no problems", and recognising the potential in this play, we got in early. I will try to answer your question. Basically a loss of circulation occurs when a zone of high porosity & permeability is penetrated by the drill bit, and the downward pressure exerted by the weight of the drilling fluid (mud) in the wellbore exceeds the upward pressure exerted by the formation fluids. Drilling mud is mixed in large mud tanks on the surface and pumped down the well inside the drill pipe. It comes out of the drill bit at the bottom of the well through nozzles and returns to the surface in the annulus (the space between the drill pipe and the walls of the wellbore. Drilling mud serves to cool the bit, clean rocks and clays from the teeth in the bit and to carry rock fragments that have been drilled (rock cuttings) back to the surface for analysis by the wellsite geologist. Lost circulation is seen at the surface as "mud losses". There are devices on the rig that measure total mud volume in the hole and in the rig's mud tanks. When this happens, pumping more mud down the hole only results in flushing mud into the reservoir. Mud does not flow back to surface. In order to regain circulation, the crews must pump lost circulation material (LCM) down the hole, hoping that it bungs up all the pore spaces in the rock that is "drinking" the drilling mud. This is what they will be attempting right now. A last resort is to pump cement down the hole to seal off a zone of lost circulation. Basically, lost circulation implies great porosity and permeability in the rock. Porosity implies that we have lots of space for fluid storage in the reservoir and permeability implies good pathways for the fluid to travel through the reservoir to our wellbore. The fact that we have a flare means that the fluid appears to be natural gas (bonus!!). Flaring is done at this stage, because as gas enters the wellbore, it becomes a part of the mud system and effectively lowers the density of the mud. If the crews are to re-establish the correct mud properties by mixing in chemicals at the surface, they must vent off any gas that does reach the surface, to get it out of the wellbore. Put simply, gas in the wellbore whilst drilling is a bad thing. Furthermore, geologically speaking, the fact that we have gas in the top of the second sand means that there is a good chance that gas will be in the lower sands too. This is because all of these sand layers are separated by organic rich shale layers, which were all deposited at roughly the same time (5 million years ago). These shales are called "source rocks" and it is the decaying of this organic matter and the slow "pressure cooking" of the rock that allows the hydrocarbons to form and migrate into pools in the Temblor's reservoir layers. I hope this doesn't confuse anyone, and apologies to the technical folk out there if I missed a step or two. S&P