Sound Energy’s (LON: SOU) TE-9 well in the Tendrara Basin in Morocco has encountered poor reservoir in the primary Triassic TAGI target and the well will be plugged and abandoned. The well was the first in a three well exploration campaign and was testing the A1 structure around 25km to the north west of the company’s Tendrara production concession, with a mid-case pre-drill estimate 0.7TCF gas in place. Since 2016, Sound has successfully drilled and tested the TE-6 and TE-7 wells in the core Tendrara area around the TE-5 discovery well, however results from the larger step out wells such as 2017’s TE-8 (which encountered tight TAGI sands to the west)and exploration further afield in TE-9 have not been as encouraging.

The Tendrara Basin in Eastern Morocco shows the same geological evolution as the adjacent basins in Algeria, where reservoir distribution is variable and unpredictable even over relatively short distances, and variation in reservoir quality can be a challenge. The next well in the programme, TE-10, will target 2.6TCF gas in place in the TAGI in an independent play concept from TE-9, 20km to the north east of TE-5 where the company will be hoping for better reservoir development. The third well is expected to target either a Paleozoic oil play in the Anoual permit area or a new large Palaeozoic structure to the North West of TE-10 that was identified from the 2017 2D seismic.

The campaign has also been designed to test the potential of the deeper Paleozoic reservoir. TE-9 encountered 630m of fine sandstones, siltstones and mudstones in the Paleozoic Westphalian which were of low porosity and poor reservoir quality, however the company believes that the well penetrated the reservoir on the downdip limit of the structure, so that the core of the Paleozoic was not tested. The TE-10 well is expected to drill 50m into the Paleozoic, providing an additional data point for the reservoir.

Meanwhile Sound is continuing to progress its 0.65TCF GOIP Tendrara development and was awarded the production concession in September 2018. The development will require five horizontal wells in addition to the existing TE-6 and TE-7 wells. FEED is underway for a gas treatment plant (CPF) and a 120km 20 inch gas export pipeline (TGEP) and the company is aiming for first gas in around two years at a rate of 60mmscfd.