"Until mid-August, coinciding with the 77th anniversary of Independence Day of the Republic of Indonesia, PHE exploration has completed (the drilling of) eight wells and (the drilling of) seven wells is ongoing and will be continued with a flow test.
Jakarta (ANTARA) - PT Pertamina's upstream subholding, PT Pertamina Hulu Energi (PHE), found new oil and gas deposits at the Explorasi R-2 offshore well in Aceh, Bajakah-011 onshore well in West Java, and Markisa-001 onshore well in Papua.

"Until mid-August, coinciding with the 77th anniversary of Independence Day of the Republic of Indonesia, PHE exploration has completed (the drilling of) eight wells and (the drilling of) seven wells is ongoing and will be continued with a flow test. We hope to achieve the target of completing (the drilling of) 29 wells at the end of this year to yield maximum fruit," PHE Exploration Director Medy Kurniawan noted in a written statement released in Jakarta on Thursday.

Kurniawan said PHE, through its exploration activities, is consistently committed and contributes to achieving national energy resilience.

In 2021, the upstream subholding managed to drill 12 exploration wells. In 2022, it made massive and aggressive efforts to improve its performance through a work plan to drill 29 exploration wells that represented a 242-percent increase as compared to 2021.

The discovery of new deposits from the three exploration wells followed the company's success in finding oil and gas deposits at Sungai Gelam Timur-1 well in Jambi, Wilela-001 well in South Sumatra, GQX-1 well in West Java, and Manpatu-1X well in Mahakam in the first semester of 2022. By August 2022, (year to date/ytd), the successful drilling ratio reached 70 percent.

"Surely, the success is the share of (efforts of) all relevant parties, internally or externally," he affirmed.

In realizing the exploration strategy, PHE has adopted three main initiatives, with the first being the existing work territorial assets where the contribution of exploration is deemed crucial to maintain and increase the existing oil and gas production, he stated.

The second initiative is a new venture strategy wherein PHE seeks potential for new exploration, while the third is a partnership strategy for sharing risk & cost and technology & knowledge transfer through an accelerated cooperation process and domestic and foreign joint bidding.

Related news: Fire-ravaged oil well in East Aceh located in PEP's working area
Related news: Indonesia entering year of oil well drilling

Translator: Faisal Yunianto, Suharto
Editor: Rahmad Nasution
Copyright © ANTARA 2022