Alba Mineral Resources plc (LON:ALBA) investors can look forward to horizontal drilling at the Horse Hill project, where the HH-2/2z well is now nearing the completion of the vertical pilot hole.

The company owns an 11.765% interest in Horse Hill Developments Limited, the project operator, and is one of two London listed stakeholders in the project.

In a statement, Alba reported that the pilot well had now been drilled, cased and cemented at around 2,019 feet. Blowout preventers will be set and tested today, before a short extension is drilled through the ‘coring point’ (where three cores will be taken from the oil bearing Portland reservoir for analysis).

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Thereafter, the programme will advance toward the ‘kick off point’ from which horizontal drilling will begin. Some 1,000 metres of horizontal drilling is planned into what is expected to be the Portland’s most productive zone.

HH-2/2z is one of two planned horizontal wells that will aim to establish valuable production from the conventional Portland oil pool.

They are intended to be exposed to more of the Portland reservoir than the successful vertical Horse Hill well, which flowed close to 30,000 barrels of crude during extended well testing (the deeper Kimmeridge zones yielded a further 39,000 barrels).

The well is expected to flow at significantly higher production rates than the 362 barrels of oil per day measured whilst testing the vertical Portland section in the current Horse Hill well.