Harvest Natural Resources Updates Drilling Operations in Indonesia

HOUSTON, Jan. 3, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Harvest Natural Resources, Inc. (NYSE: HNR) announced today that the exploration well KD-1ST, being drilled onshore Sulawesi, has reached a total measured depth (TD) of 14,437 feet (13,576 feet true vertical depth) and is being plugged and abandoned with oil shows.

KD-1 was the second exploratory well of a two well program on the Budong PSC drilled to test stacked Miocene and Eocene targets within a thrusted anticline.  Spud on June 20, 2011, the well was initially drilled to a depth of 9,633 feet and sidetracked after the drill string was severed.  The sidetrack KD-1ST was initially drilled to a total depth of 11,800 feet and logged.  The evaluation of cuttings, logs and sidewall cores demonstrated the presence of oil over a 200 feet section of low permeability and low porosity clastic rocks in the Miocene. The oil shows have proven the existence of a working petroleum system in the Karama Basin. 

Harvest elected to deepen the well as a sole risk operation, to a final total depth of 14,437 feet to explore for the main Eocene objective. Although the well encountered both Oligocene and Eocene stratigraphy before drilling reached the BOP pressure limit, the primary Eocene reservoir target had not yet been reached.  Biostratigraphy indicates the section at TD to be Eocene deep water shales.  Nearby within the basin are a number of Eocene outcrops with known fluvial reservoir and source rocks, along with oil and gas seeps.  Harvest expects to expense the net dry hole cost of $22.9 million in the current quarter.

Post well evaluation will include reprocessing of the seismic to pre-stack depth migration and correlation of the KD-1ST well and outcrop data to better define prospectivity for both Miocene and Eocene targets within the Karama basin.  

Tately Budong-Budong N.V. is the operator of the Budong-Budong Block.  Harvest owns a 64.4 percent working interest in the Budong-Budong PSC.

About Harvest Natural Resources

Harvest Natural Resources, Inc., headquartered in Houston, Texas, is an independent energy company with principal operations in Venezuela, with exploration assets in Indonesia, Gabon, China and Oman and business development offices in Singapore and the United Kingdom.  For more information visit the Company's website at www.harvestnr.com. 

CONTACT:
Stephen C. Haynes
Vice President, Chief Financial Officer
(281) 899-5716

This press release may contain projections and other forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. They include estimates and timing of expected oil and gas production, oil and gas reserve projections of future oil pricing, future expenses, planned capital expenditures, anticipated cash flow and our business strategy. All statements other than statements of historical facts may constitute forward-looking statements. Although Harvest believes that the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are reasonable, it can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to have been correct. Actual results may differ materially from Harvest's expectations as a result of factors discussed in Harvest's 2010 Annual Report on Form 10-K and other public filings.

Harvest may use certain terms such as resource base, contingent resources, prospective resources, probable reserves, possible reserves, non-proved reserves or other descriptions of volumes of reserves.  These estimates are by their nature more speculative than estimates of proved reserves and accordingly, are subject to substantially greater risk of being actually realized by the Company. 

SOURCE Harvest Natural Resources, Inc.