Oil and Gas

PetroQuest announces new O and G discovery

A new cache of oil and natural gas, described as a “significant discovery,” was announced Tuesday by PetroQuest Energy at its Thunder Bayou well prospect in Vermilion Parish.

According to a press release issued by the Lafayette-based company, production at the new site is expected to begin in the second quarter of next year. Estimates show the new site will produce a daily rate of about “25,000 to 30,000 Mcf [cubic feet] of gas, plus associated oil and natural gas liquids, which will be determined during the upcoming well test.” The site is believed to be comprised of about 70 percent natural gas.

The company compares the new site with its existing La Cantera project, which is located about two miles south of Thunder Bayou. The plus, according to Tuesday´s release, is that the geography of the Thunder Bayou site will allow for quicker setup and is expected to be cheaper to operate than La Cantera, which is situated in the marshlands of Vermilion Parish.

In a prepared statement, PetroQuest CEO and President Charles Goodson comments on the Thunder Bayou discovery:

We are extremely excited about our Thunder Bayou discovery and the transformative impact it will have on our production reserves and cash flow profiles. This discovery highlights the talents of our Gulf Coast team, which has achieved an impressive 70 percent success rate in this complex basin over the last 10 years, and further supports our multi-basin approach.

Early expectations are that Thunder Bayou is a project similar in scale to La Cantera, where gross total project finding and development costs are expected to be less than $1 per Mcfe and each of the three wells drilled have paid out in less than one year.