Buru Energy spuds shallow Canning basin well

Buru Energy Ltd. and its Rafael Shallow Joint Venture (RSJV) partners spudded the Rafael Shallow 1 well in EP 428 in Western Australia’s onshore Canning basin.

The well is being drilled by the Silver City Drilling Rig 24 and is targeting reservoirs in the Poole and Grant formation between 750 m and 1,250 m MD. The Poole and Grant reservoirs are clastic (sandstone) reservoirs like the previously discovered shallow oil pools on the Lennard Shelf in the vicinity of the legacy Blina oilfield.

Drilling operations are expected to be concluded in October 2024. Prospective gross unrisked resource volumes of recoverable oil are 3.2-79 million bbl, with 19 million bbl best estimate.

Buru Energy chief executive officer Thomas Nador said the well will be the first drilled in the Canning basin since 2021, "the year in which Buru discovered Rafael (deep) - the first proven significant conventional onshore gas and condensate resource in Western Australia north of Karratha."   

Canning basin is a geological unit in the southwest Kimberley region about 2,300 km north of Perth. The area of Buru’s operations is low topographic relief and is dominated by rangelands with large cattle grazing properties covering most of the area. The basin is the largest sedimentary basin in Western Australia covering an area of about 530,000 sq km. Geologically, the basin has similarities with highly productive Palaeozoic aged basins worldwide and is one of the few remaining areas in onshore Australia that is under-explored for petroleum.

The Rafael Shallow Joint Venture (RSJV) is comprised of Buru, Twinsouth Holdings Pty Ltd. (Twinsouth), and Jingie Investments Pty Ltd. (Jingie).