Based in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, Bankers Petroleum Ltd. specializes in oil and gas exploration and the recovery of unconventional petroleum assets.

Premier Business Partners:

Alberta Oil Tool Couger Pump Supply & Service Ltd. GrenCo Industries HOH Oilfield Services Ltd. KUDU Industries Inc. Adept Innovations Ltd.

Since its start three years ago, Bankers Petroleum Ltd. has grown by taking advantage of unconventional opportunities on two continents, President and acting CEO Richard Wadsworth says. Based in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, the company specializes in oil and gas exploration and the recovery of unconventional petroleum assets.

Operating in Albania, the company produces heavy oil in the Patos Marinza oilfield. There, Wadsworth says, Bankers Petroleum has a resource with 2 billion barrels of original oil in place where only about 6 percent has been recovered to date through primary recovery means.

Strong commodity prices combined with the opportunity to apply secondary and enhanced oil recovery could result in reserves recoveries increasing to 25 to 40 percent.

The company holds interests in four prospects in the northern and central United States, where it pursues exploration of shale gas plays.

Company Benchmarks
The company just reached a milestone: the first Woodford shale production from the Arkoma basin in Oklahoma, having drilled four horizontal wells in total to date. This is expected to lead to a development plan next year and ultimately, has a 400 billion cubic feet potential to Bankers Petroleum.

In the Palo Duro basin in Texas, Bankers Petroleum says it is conducting technical analysis as it moves to the testing phase of its program.

In addition, Bankers Petroleum is in the process of acquiring 2-D seismic on its upstate New York acreage. This will be used to evaluate the hydrothermal dolomite concept which is being developed by other operators in the field.

“We’re a junior oil and gas company that is resource-rich,” Wadsworth declares. “We’ve got some tremendous assets that allow us to continue [growing] production reserves [and] cash flows.”

Perfect Timing
An industry veteran with more than 16 years’ experience in domestic and international gas and oil operations, Wadsworth founded Bankers Petroleum in 2004. Previously, he was the business unit manager in Albania for Premier Oil plc and led heavy oil and shallow gas developments for Koch Exploration Canada.

It was at Premier Oil that Wadsworth got the inspiration to start Bankers Petroleum.

After developing in Albania for a decade, “Premier Oil, through its joint venture company Anglo-Albanian Petroleum (AAP), decided to exit the project and hand it back to the government,” he remembers.

“Premier was a company focused more on Southeast Asia and [the] west coast [of] Africa, so Albania didn’t really fit going forward,” he states.

But Wadsworth wasn’t ready to leave Albania. “I grew up overseas and always loved living in different cultures,” he says, noting that he was raised in such countries as Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and Peru.     “I have that international bug in me,” he continues. “So, when I had the opportunity to join Premier in Albania, I jumped on it.”

To continue developing in Albania, Wadsworth joined forces with colleagues who were bankers. He explains that they also possessed the same excitement for pursuing international heavy oil.

“We went after this project with the Albanian government,” he recalls. “Timing was key in that I was already in-country and we had an established team.”

Bankers Petroleum negotiated a deal with Albania that allowed it to take over operations almost immediately. “We continued as an ongoing entity from day one,” he says. “It was a fantastic opportunity for our company and our shareholders.”

The takeover also allowed Bankers Petroleum to save many jobs that were lost when Premier decided to step out. “AAP had about 80 employees,” Wadsworth remembers.

“We pretty much hired every single one of them back,” he says. “Not only is the resource below the ground critical to success, so is the one above ground – the people.”

After its first eight months of operation in Albania, “We ran across the opportunity in the United States for shale gas,” Wadsworth remembers. He notes that the company felt that adding operations in a “very solid country such as the United States made some sense.”

While its work in Albania was a development play, Bankers Petroleum saw in the United States a chance to bring an element of exploration to the company. Although the company has encountered its share of challenges, “The team we have there has done great job,” Wadsworth says.

“They’ve single-handedly brought the Oklahoma property to shale gas production, leading, we hope, to development next year, and have progressed the learning curve on Texas to the point where we are exploring in what we believe is the core area,” he says. “A completely new basin such as in Texas takes time to establish – as the main landholder, it’s a significant accomplishment to have progressed the science to this point.”