The Houston-headquartered company recently returned to Taranaki after a three-year break and has again set up office in New Plymouth, from where it will direct all drilling operations for the as-yet unnamed well.
"We did a scoping trip here in June to begin re-establishment of our base of drilling operations in New Plymouth; now we will be here until the end of drilling operations, either late this year or early next," drilling manager Steve Butler told EnergyReview.Net.
Conoco (UK) Ltd has contracted to take the Diamond Offshore Drilling Ocean Bounty rig after it has finished drilling the Pohokura North-1 well off New Plymouth for the Shell-Todd-Preussag consortium.
Butler said it was planned the un-named Conoco well would be drilled into a prospect presently called E-One and would spud sometime in November.
Whereas Conoco's first well, Wakanui-1, was drilled off the Kaipara Harbour during 1999 in almost 1500m of water, Butler said the second well would be drilled in shallower water further south and only approximately 26 nautical miles offshore.
"This well's going to be drilled in one of several prospects we have identified and it just happens to be in the southern portion of PEP 38602 and pretty close to the Taranaki Basin."
He declined to discuss target formations or depths, saying details had yet to be submitted to the Crown Minerals unit in Wellington, but added that the well should only take 30 or so days to drill.
The Ocean Bounty contract was for a one-well program only, so no matter what the results Conoco would not be drilling in licence PEP 38602 again in the near future. Well data would be analysed back in Houston before any further work program commitments were made, Butler added.
Conoco, which officially became ConocoPhillips after last Friday's US Federal Trade Commission merger approval, has a work program commitment to drill a second well in PEP 38602 - New Zealand's largest exploration acreage at 48,865 sqkm - before next April when its second five-year term expires
Conoco (UK) Ltd acts as PEP 38602 operator, with a 56.67% interest, while Maui, Kapuni and Pohokura partner Todd Petroleum Mining holds a 10% stake and Japan's Inpex Corporation a 33.33% interest.
Crown Minerals says the first Conoco well, Wakanui-1, was the only deepwater well so far drilled in the Northland Basin, which extends over 120,00 sqkm on and offshore. The potential reservoir rocks are late Cretaceous terrestrial - paralic - near shore sandstones, Eocene turbidites, Miocene volcaniclastics, and Miocene turbidite sandstones.
The PEP 39413 Maari partners - Shell, Todd and OMV - are believed to have an option to pick up the rig after the Conoco well for at least one appraisal well in the marginal Maari field south of Maui.
