ISLAMABAD: Oil and Gas Development Company Limited (OGDCL) is carrying out exploration activities in different parts of the country with around 17 rigs, a senior official in the company said.
He said the company was confident to achieving its target of drilling 31 new wells set for the current financial year.
"Under the target, the company has to dig 31 wells in all provinces and it will hopefully be achieved by end of June this year," he said while talking to APP.
The official said the company had nine own rigs and their drilling capacity was from 2,500 to 5,500 meters, which were almost 35 to 40 years old.
Besides, he said, OGDCL had eight rented rigs operating at different oil and gas wells with contractors' own workforce and other resources.
The official informed that the company had drilled, through both owned and rented rigs, around 84 oil and gas wells in different parts of the country during last four years and made 13 discoveries from September 2012 to January 2016.
Answering a question, he said, OGDCL was not in favour of buying more rigs as per international practice of getting the job done through contractor rigs.
Citing the reason for opting rented rigs, he said maintenance of own rigs, which were mostly years old, was expensive, so "We prefer contractor rigs."
The company's deployment ratio was almost 250 workers per rig, while a contractor rig was manned by 50 employees, he said, adding that usually OGDCL rigs were used in sensitive areas where contractors were not allowed to operate.
Presently, the official said, 17 wells were under the drilling process, adding that nine new wells had been spud and five were in the testing phase. In the current month, six more drills would be carried out and the company would complete all the process by June, 2016, he added.
Currently, he said, the company had 24 exploration licences and it was actively busy in exploration and production activities in Balochistan where some areas were inaccessible earlier.
OGDCL had also initiated 2D and 3D seismic data surveys in eight blocks in the province to step up its oil and gas exploration activities.
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