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Gold/Mining/Energy : KERM'S KORNER -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Herb Duncan who wrote (11110)	6/8/1998 12:04:00 PM
From: SofaSpud	Respond to of 15196

FIELD ACTIVITIES / Drilling at Sable Island DRILLING RIG RETURNS TO VENTURE HALIFAX, N.S., June 08 /CNW/ - The Rowan Gorilla II drilling rig today moved on to the Sable Offshore Energy Project's (SOEP) Venture field, 13 kilometers east of Sable Island. It is the first time a rig has been on the field since the days of exploration in the early 1980's and signals the beginning of production well drilling. The harsh environment jackup rig will spud in a day or two after positioning itself over the drilling jacket which was placed by the Saipem S7000 heavy lift vessel in March. The jacket was fabricated in Nova Scotia at the MM Industra/Brown & Root facility at Dartmouth. SOEP Well Construction Manager, Charles Rogers, said: ''This is really a great time for the project, especially the drilling team which has been preparing and planning for this date for almost two years.'' The Gorilla rig arrived in Halifax in April where it was outfitted for work on the Scotian Shelf. The rig, contracted by SOEP, was subleased to PanCanadian Petroleum Ltd to drill an exploration well for at the nearby Grand Pre location. The rig was returned to SOEP on the weekend. SOEP will drill five production wells at Venture. More than 70 Nova Scotians are working on the Gorilla II. ''We will batch drill the early stages for all five wells, setting the conductor pipes, surface and intermediate casing,'' Rogers said. ''We will then progressively drill each well to the target depth of about 5,000 meters.'' Drilling of four wells at Venture is expected to be completed next summer with the fifth well being completed after the topsides have been placed. Santa Fe Drilling's harsh environment jackup rig Galaxy II is due to arrive in Nova Scotia waters in early October this year and will begin similar drilling activity on five wells at Thebaud and two wells at North Triumph. Natural gas will flow from the first offshore wells in November next year to a gas processing plant under construction at Goldboro, Nova Scotia. From there the gas will be transported to markets in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and New England by the Maritimes and Northeast Pipeline, which will be in service in 1999. The Sable project owners are: Mobil Oil Canada Properties Limited 50.8 per cent; Shell Canada Limited 31.3 per cent; Imperial Oil Resources Limited 9.0 per cent; Nova Scotia Resources Limited 8.4 per cent; Mosbacher Operating Limited 0.5 per cent. -30- For further information: Graeme Connell, Sable Offshore Energy Project, (902) 496-0955. Mike DuBose, Rowan Companies Limited, (902) 469-1973