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Greymouth Petroleum flows Kowhai field gas from Matapo sands
29 August 2008, Source: Greymouth Petroleum and Lindsay Clark - Greymouth Petroleum has reported it has test flowed the first commercial gas from the Matapo sandstone formation in Taranaki at its onshore Kowhai-1 well east of New Plymouth.
Auckland-based Greymouth Petroleum said it has successfully drillstem tested gas at rates exceeding 1 million cubic feet a day with limited pressure drawdowns from its Kowhai field in PEP 38742 near Waitara.
Mark Dunphy, Greymouth chief executive officer said the flow of Matapo gas is the first commercial flow of hydrocarbons from the Matapo sandstone in Taranaki.
Greymouth said the Matapo sandstone is present across large areas of the Taranaki Basin.
Matapo was first identified and tested in the Urenui-1 well drilled in 1970 and situated in what is now Greymouth’s Turangi mining permit.
Todd Energy also encountered gas-saturated Matapo sands in 2005 when it drilled the Terrace-1 well from an onshore site near the New Plymouth airport to an offshore target south west of the Pohokura gas condensate field. Todd declared Terrace-1 uncommercial with the Oligocene Matapo sands in the Otaraoa Formation yielding only a small gas pay.
Kowhai is located between Greymouth’s Turangi field PMP 38161 to the east and PEP 38773 to the west and close to Greymouth and common carrier gas pipelines and Greymouth processing facilities.
The Kowhai permit is operated by Petrochem Ltd, now a Greymouth company, which was last year bought from fertiliser company Ballance Agri-Nutrients Ltd which owns the Kapuni ammonia-urea fertiliser plant which uses natural gas as a feedstock.
Greymouth will sell gas from Kowhai to the gas spot market it has developed and also supply the Balance plant.
