Highlands Natural Resources' tech found to protect gas wells from 'bashing'

Shares in Highlands Natural Resources soared nearly 35% on Wednesday as the oil and gas investment company announced that it had proved the effectiveness of its DT Ultravert technology at a US basin by protecting wells from damage.

After three weeks of testing on two natural gas wells operated by LAramie Energy in the Piceance Basin in Colorado, DT Ultravert was found to protecting existing parent well from damage caused by ‘bashing’, a side effect from fracking wells in close proximity which can damage reservoirs, and enhanced will productivity by re-fracking horizontal wells.

No reduction was observed in the original decline curve in either parent well, indicating that bashing had been successfully avoided.

The desired pressure build-up in both parent wells using DT Ultravert was a critical element of a successful diversion process. Overall, the results suggested a successful initial application the technology in parent well protection and child well enhancement applications.

The test saw that nitrogen injected into parent wells before and during a separate fracking programme on child wells nearby, increased pressure in the parent wells, which averted fluids away from the already fracked area.

The results from the test found that DT Ultravert can achieve significant and sustained down-hole pressure that effectively diverts fluids from depleted areas of the reservoir, it can prevent well bashing, and that it can enhance the stimulation of child wells and improve production performance.

Vice president of engineering, Domingo Mata said, "The positive initial results from our first test of DT Ultravert represent an important milestone for Highlands and all stakeholders in this technology.

“We believe that the success of this testing and the preliminary conclusions outlined here will boost our ongoing commercialisation efforts for DT Ultravert."

Shares in Highlands Natural Resources were up 34.87% to 34.56p at 1407 BST.