World's Energy

03 September, 2008 - Upstream OnLine - Russian oil company Lukoil has sold Gaz de France a 15% stake in the Yalama exploration project in Azerbaijan's sector of the Caspian Sea. The deal has been approved by the project's other shareholder, Azeri national oil company Socar, Lukoil said in a statement. The contract area covers 3037 square kilometres on the D-222 block where a production sharing contract was signed by Lukoil and Socar in July 1997. The exploration period on the licence will expire at the end of 2011. The duration of the development and production period will be 25 years with a possibility to extend that by five years. The minimal exploration programme for D-222 includes 2D and 3D seismic and the drilling of two exploration wells. A seismic survey was completed in 2004 and the first well was drilled using the ‘Heydar Aliyev’ drilling rig in 2005. The well, which was drilled to a depth of 4500 meters showed some signs of gas but no commercial hydrocarbon reserves were discovered. Drilling of the second exploration well is scheduled for November this year.