Azerbaijan, Baku, 3 June / Trend corr A. Badalova/ Next week, Azerbaijani-American joint venture Caspian Drilling Company (CDC) will deliver Istiglal rig to the drilling place of the fifth exploration well (SDX-5) in the offshore Shah Deniz field, Operating Manager of CDP Paul Johnson said on 3 June.
"After the second exploration well is liquidated in Inam next week, we will move the rig to SDX5," Johnson said.
CDC is the drilling contractor of BP on the Shah Deniz and Inam fields.
Drilling of SDX- 5 in the Shah Deniz to take 150-180 days will enable specification of the reserves in the field (presently 1trln cu m). Johnson did not divulge the projected depth of SDX-5.
The drilling in the Inam, where two weeks ago CDC commenced liquidation of the second exploration well, did not reveal commercial hydrocarbon reserves. During drilling BP almost achieved the projected depth of 5,350m.
The sides to the Inam project are the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (50%), BP (25%, operator), the Korean National Oil Corporation (20%) and Shell (5%).
The contract on development of off-shore Shah Deniz field was signed on 4 June 1996. The sides to the contract are ВР (operator - 25.5%), Statoil (25.5%), SOCAR (10%), LukAgip (10%), NICO (10%), Total (10%), and TPAO (9%).