London-listed energy firm Gulf Keystone Petroleum (GKP) has issued an operational update providing its latest independent audit and estimates of crude oil reserves at its fields in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region of northern Iraq.

This includes the Shaikan field, the largest of GKP assets which was discovered in 2009 and declared commercial in August 2012. Since then, the company has submitted a field development plan to the Kurdish authorities, comprising more than 100 wells.

London-based ERC Equipoise Limited (ERCE) estimates proven and probable reserves for the first phase of development at the field’s Jurassic reservoirs amount to 299 million barrels.

The remaining volumes have been classified as “contingent resources”, which will depend on the refinement of the additional phases. These are estimated at 440 million barrels of oil and 164 billion cubic feet of solution gas.

ERCE also estimated the volume of oil and gas in the other field intervals, with 124 million barrels of oil in the Cretaceous interval and 138 million barrels of oil and 411 billion cubic feet of gas in the Triassic interval. 

ERCE’s audit also covers GKP’s capital expenditure plan, which totals $815m for phase 1. This includes $206m for two early production facilities, $320m for the Shaikan central processing facility (CPF) and $59.5m for a 24-inch, 15-kilometre pipeline.

Phase 1 of the Shaikan field development began in July 2013 at 40,000 barrels a day (b/d), increasing to 150,000 b/d in the next three years and 250,000 b/d by 2018.