Helium One Global Ltd (AIM:HE1, OTCQB:HLOGF, FRA:9K3) is looking forward to using the data that it has gained from this year’s drilling to target both deeper and shallower plays, in its Phase 2 campaign at the Rukwa project in Tanzania.
The company rounded off its maiden phase of drilling in August after finding strong indications of what could eventually prove to be large natural source of helium, and, whilst the first two wells were unable to recover gas for sampling, the exploration team is sufficiently encouraged to go straight into the next phase.
It starts with new geophysical work, specifically a programme to capture new seismic data to build on the findings to date and to increase the chance of success in future drilling.
“We’re moving into Phase Two which starts with a relook at geophysics,” David Minchin said in a podcast interview.
“Drilling is very expensive and if you drill blind or drill in the wrong places, it is a waste of money.
“Now, with the information we’ve gained from Tai-1 we are able to identify new play types.”
The Helium One chief executive noted that there are shallow targets which require other types of geophysics to assess further, similarly there are also deeper targets which will benefit from fresh data capture.
“We’ve seen this seal and we’ve seen how it looks in 2D seismic, we can see how it continues and gets better the deeper into the basin that you go,” he added.
“We know we’re going to need to mobilise a bigger rig to drill next year.
“We want to get several large deep targets which we can test at the same time, that needs a return to geophysics. So that we can drill better and in the right places next year.”
“Exploration is an iterative process,” Minchin added.
