Area Drilling

Norway

Agip U.K. Ltd. let a contract for an undisclosed sum to Aker Geo, a unit of Oslo-based Aker Maritime AS, to carry out a seismic survey over recently awarded North Sea blocks.

Aker chartered the just-launched CGG Alize survey ship to carry out the work, expected to take 1 month starting June 20.

The assignment involves acquisitions and processing of 3D seismic data over 500 sq km on Agip's Block 8/19, 8/20, and 8/25 license areas. Much of the processing will be done aboard the vessel.

Italy

Exploration contractors Fugro-Geoteam AS, Oslo, and Wavetech Geophysical Inc., Denver, made available nonexclusive 2D seismic data over a 3,345 km grid between the heel of Italy and Malta in the Mediterranean Sea.

This is the only regionally conformable survey of the area since the Italian government produced data in the 1970s and provides a modern data base for structural and stratigraphic interpretation of the area and its hydrocarbon prospects, Fugro said. The data tie to the Alexia-2 well, drilled to 6,482 m true vertical depth into oil-bearing Triassic carbonates.

The data are on strike with three producing provinces: Sicily-Malta channel, Appenine foredeep, and Adriatic shelf.

Nigeria

The government has delineated 25 blocks in 2,000-5,000 ft of water for eventual bidding, but two appear to overlap blocks drawn by the Republic of Sao Tome and Principe, a group of islands in the Gulf of Guinea.

Nigeria has marked off Oil Prospecting Leases 317, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326, and 327. These blocks lie south of OPLs 312-315, in the Benin basin about 100 km south of Lagos in Nigerian waters.

The other 15 blocks, numbered OPL 251-265, lie west of Mobil-Ocean Energy's Block B. Block B is in Equatorial Guinea waters west of Bioko Island. Block B rests against a "traditional boundary" with Nigeria (see map, OGJ, July 27, 1998, p. 96).

Sao Tome has granted a Mobil Corp. unit rights to 22 deepwater blocks covering 12 million acres for an 18 month technical evaluation. Some 13 of those blocks are in waters adjacent to international boundaries with Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea (see map, OGJ, Oct. 5, 1998, p. 112).

Sao Tome Blocks 1 and 2 and Nigeria OPL 247 and 251 appear to partly overlap in an area about 150 km west-southwest of Bioko Island.