Dana Gas, the Middle East's first and largest regional private sector natural gas company, has announced another gas discovery in one of the company's concessions in the Egyptian Nile Delta. The Tulip-1 well is set to add up to 30 billion cubic feet of gas to the company's reserves in Egypt. It followed the three gas discoveries earlier in the Nile Delta area: two dry gas discoveries at the firm's Sondos-1 and 2 wells, and one gas/condensate discovery at the Azhar-1 well. Dana Gas' aggressive drilling campaign in Egypt began in 2008 and continues to add new gas reserves in 2009. The Tulip-1 well is located in the West El Qantara Concession, approximately 15 km from the Company's South El Manzala gas processing facilities and 7 km from the recent discovery Salma Delta-1. The well was spudded on April 25, 2009 and reached a total depth of approximately 2200 meters within the Messinian Abu Madi formation. The well encountered 11 meters of net pay in a good quality sandstone reservoir of the Abu Madi formation. The production test yielded production of 11.4 million standard cubic feet per day of gas and 318 barrels of condensate per day. Dana Gas' CEO Ahmed Al-Arbeed said: “The discovery at the Tulip-1 well represents our fourth discovery in our 2009 drilling campaign. We are delighted that the extensive prospect generation effort, followed by a very effective drilling campaign, continues to produce positive results into 2009 following the outstanding results of 2008, which will further boost the company's production.” Dana Gas Egypt president Dr. Hany Elsharkawi said the development plan for this discovery is currently being prepared. “The plan includes the drilling of a number of appraisal and development wells that will support the final assessment of the field and the construction of a new gas and condensate plant to accommodate the production coming from the nearby Salma Delta discovery as well.” Dana Gas is the sixth highest natural gas producer in Egypt. The company ended 2008 with a daily production rate from its Egyptian operations of approximately 31,650 barrels of oil equivalent (boe) that has recently increased to about 35,000 boe due to the tie-in of El Basant field. A further increase is expected in June after the Sondos field tie-in. Meanwhile, Dana Gas posted of AED247 million revenue in the first quarter from sale of hydrocarbons or a drop of 9 percent over the same period last year from similar production volume due to lower LPG and condensate realized prices. Gross profits increased by 64 percent to AED68 million compared to the same period last year. __
