ONGC Chairman and Managing Director, RS Sharma said that Discoveries needs to be appraised and commerciality of these discoveries are yet to be established”.

KG basin:

The IE block located six kilometers off Yanam coast in the KG basin has discovered gas. This is the second discovery made by the company in the KG basin. In December-2006, KG-DWN-98/2-UD-1 well in the ultra deep waters of KG offshore has discovered first gas in water depth of 2841 meters (m).

Initial in place production volumes are expected to be very promising and ONGC is exploring the possibility of producing this high pressure gas fields by subsea to onshore terminal concept so that its proximity can shore.

Charada-3:

Charada-3 exploratory well was drilled in January, 2009 and two zones comprising one in Deccan Trap (616m-758m) and another in Olpad formation, which have different layers in the interval from 521m-599m, showed occurrence of heavy and viscous oil on preliminary testing.

A large accumulation area, minimum of eight square kilometers, is anticipated and has enlarged the prospects of entire eastern margin of the north Cambay basin. It is not easy to produce oil discovered from Charada with conventional methods. As ONGC has experience of handling oil production issues of similar nature in oil fields such as Santhal, Balol and Lanwa, it can start production soon from this field also, once technological studies are complete.

To gain maximum recovery of oil from the field, ONGC is analyzing many options such as thermal in-situ, steam injection and microbial based solutions.

Matar:

After discovering oil in Matar-11 well ONGC achieved success in Matar region in Vadodara district. In March 2009, the Matar-11 well was drilled and flowed oil and gas from two intervals comprising of one from 1763-1759m, 1757m-1755m and another from 1753m to1750m. 50-70 m3/d of oil flows and gas flow rate of 6900m3/d were achieved during preliminary testing.

The well being placed on production is now flowing oil at the rate of 40 m3/d from the second interval. This well falls in a block which was earlier awarded to Niko Resources Ltd. and Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation Ltd. which were not successful in their effort to discover hydrocarbons. As ONGC id on the eastern margin of the Bharuch block, this oil discovery is very important for it.