Northland Falkland basin operating oil explorer Rockhopper Exploration (LON:RKH) has secured an additional well slot on the Ocean Guardian drilling rig, allowing it to drill another well in the Falklands.
The company will soon spud the 14/10-6 well, its third appraisal well on the Sea Lion discovery. This well will be followed by another three wells.
Faroe Petroleum (LON:FPM) has started drilling on its 50 percent owned Fulla exploration prospect on the Shetland area of the Atlantic margin.
The first well on Fulla will target the potentially oil bearing Devonian Clair reservoir sands at a depth of 2,100 metres. The prospect is located just north of BP’s (LON:BP) Clair oil field, which is currently producing at a rate of 40,000 barrels per day.
The drilling operations on the prospect are expected to be completed within the summer weather period.
In December 2010 Faroe farmed out a 50 percent interest in Licence P.1161 to Canadian Overseas Petroleum Limited (COPL). Under the terms of the farm-out agreement, COPL will cover 60 percent of the well costs for the Fulla well.
WH Smith (LON:SMWH) reported that group sales in the first 18 weeks of the second half of 2011 declined 1 percent compared to the same period of 2010.
Like for like sales dropped 4 percent. Sales at WH Smith’s travel business rose 2 percent during the period, while sales at the high street business fell 3 percent.
“The economic environment remains uncertain and whilst we continue to be cautious about consumer spending, we remain confident in the outcome for the full year,” WH Smith said in today’s statement.
Small cap explorer Victoria Oil & Gas (LON:VOG) announced today that re-interpretation of 845 kilometres of reprocessed 2D seismic data from the West Medvezhye oil, gas and condensate licence area in Russia has started.
The results of the analysis are scheduled to be considered in a workshop in Tyumen, Russia in July 2011.
The company has also begun technical and subsurface studies for commercialisation of the large prospective resources of the Well 103 discovery at West Med.
Shares in Premier Farnell (LON:PFL) slid 22 percent this morning after the FTSE 250 electronics supplier issued a profit warning.
Premier Farnell reported that its May and June sales reached 1.4 percent compared to the same period last year, missing its target of 6-8 percent growth. As a result, sales growth for the second quarter will be below the 6-8 percent guidance.
“It is now apparent that significant inventory purchases were made in April and early May by industrial and technology customers to service their underlying demand following the Japanese earthquake,” said Premier Farnell.
The company said that in the wake of the global economic slowdown, this inventory will now take longer to be utilised before demand returns to “more normal levels”.
Caza Oil & Gas (LON:CAZA, TSE:CAZ) reported that log data from a newly drilled well at the Bongo property in Wharton County in Texas indicated potential oil pay sections in its targeted formations.
Most importantly, the data gathered from the O.B. Ranch No.2 well confirmed Caza’s theory that the previous well, O.B. Ranch No.1, produced from the fringe of a larger oil bearing Cook Mountain section.
The company is currently preparing the O.B. Ranch No.2 well for further completion operations in the Cook Mountain. These operations will include fracture stimulation, a procedure designed to increase production from the well.