Whitebark Energy Limited announced that the StarValley 201 drilling rig has arrived at the Wizard Lake Oil and Gas Field (Wizard Lake) in Alberta, Canada and has spud the Rex-4 development well. Stage 1 activities will involve drilling a vertical hole to approximately 1,150 meters True Vertical Depth (TVD) at which point a tangent will be established to build the angle of the wellbore as it passes through the Vikingand Joli Fou stratigraphic markers, entering the Manville Formation and then passing the critical Sparky Coal marker. The Company will then drill a 2,400-meter horizontal section within the producing Rex sandstone reservoir which lies immediately beneath the Sparky coal.

Whitebark aims to complete Stage 1 drilling activities within 14 days, targeting demonstration of oil saturation in the wellbore. If successful, the Company plans to complete a 50-stage hydraulic fracture stimulation shortly thereafter as part of its Stage 2 drilling plan. The Company has modelled initial post-clean up production rates of approximately 300 barrels of oil and 1,400 mscf of gas per day which will lift total Wizard Lake production to approximately ~750boepd.

The Company expects ultimate recovery of approximately 155,000 barrels of oil and 1.3 Bcf gas from Rex-4.