LONDON - the FTSE 250 oil and gas group has announced two new oil discoveries in Egypt including a successful exploration well in the North Zeit Bay production sharing contract area, onshore Gulf of Suez in Egypt, where it holds a 100% interest. The second discovery followed the successful drilling and testing of the Fayoum-2x well in the East Beni Suef concession, onshore Egypt, where Dana holds a 50% working interest. Dana said the Lorcan-1x well in North Zeit Bay had been drilled to a total depth of 7,500 feet, encountering good quality oil bearing sands in the Kareem formation in line with its prognosis prior to drilling. During the drill stem test, the well flowed strongly with high downhole pressures delivering flow rates of up to 4,714 barrels of oil per day. Dana is understood to be in discussion with the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation (EGPC) in order to achieve early production from the Lorcan oil field. The company has now moved the rig to drill the Fin-1x exploration well, which has now spudded. The Fin-1x well is expected to take approximately 45 days to drill with the key aim being to prove up further oil reserves on trend with the Lorcan oil discovery. At the Fayoum-2x well, oil was discovered in the Upper Bahariya formation, with net pay of 64 feet, and in the A/R G-20 sands, with net pay of 10 feet. Test data indicates that the well should be capable of flowing at oil rates of approximately 600 barrels of oil equivalent per day. The operator is currently progressing plans to bring this new discovery on stream. The FTSE 250 company said the Bamboo well in the Nile Delta, operated by GDF Suez and seen by analysts as a key well in the company's exploration programme, found sands which were water bearing and was temporarily abandoned. Dana's shares fell 5 per cent to 1,202 pence at 0822 GMT, making it one of the top-losers in Britain's mid-cap index. Dana, which also has oil and gas assets in the North Sea and Morocco, also said two of its wells onshore Egypt made oil discoveries. The Lorcan-1x well encountered good quality oil bearing sands and flowed at a rate of up to 4,714 barrels a day while the Fayoum-2x well also found oil and should be capable of flowing at rates of around 600 barrels of oil per day. "The Lorcan oil discovery is an excellent result which has exceeded Dana's expectations," said chief executive Tom Cross He added that the company would seek to bring the oil into production as soon as possible and as such had started talks with the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation. Oriel Securities analyst Brendan Wilders said that Lorcan looked better than pre-drill expectations but the abandonment of Bamboo had overshadowed the Lorcan discovery. "The focus was clearly on the Bamboo well, which was a particularly high impact well, so there's an element of disappointment about that," he said. Dana also said its Monkwell well in the UK Southern North Sea made a gas discovery which was too small to be economic.
