- Offshore Namibia, the success rate in offshore discoveries has been phenomenal so far.
- This week, TotalEnergies and QatarEnergy said they were expanding their efforts to explore for oil and gas in the Orange Basin offshore Namibia.
- In Uruguay, Brazil’s neighbor to the south, a subsidiary of Chevron entered in a deal this week to buy 60% and assume operatorship of an offshore exploration block.
The oil industry has found its newest exploration hotspot offshore Namibia. The high success rate of drilling and appraisal activity offshore Africa’s southwestern coast is spurring Big Oil to boost acreage in the area and seek other exploration frontiers.
After years of muted interest in high-impact frontier exploration due to the budget austerity after the 2015-2016 crash and the crash in demand during Covid, major international oil firms and their smaller junior partners are ramping up exploration again, hoping to find the next Guyana, where Exxon and Hess have discovered more than 11 billion barrels of oil in place.
Namibia Success
Offshore Namibia, the success rate in discoveries has been phenomenal so far—companies have confirmed 15 discoveries of commercial volumes of oil or gas out of 17 exploration wells drilled since February 2022, the Financial Times notes.
The oil industry has found its newest exploration hotspot offshore Namibia. The high success rate of drilling and appraisal activity offshore Africa’s southwestern coast is spurring Big Oil to boost acreage in the area and seek other exploration frontiers.
After years of muted interest in high-impact frontier exploration due to the budget austerity after the 2015-2016 crash and the crash in demand during Covid, major international oil firms and their smaller junior partners are ramping up exploration again, hoping to find the next Guyana, where Exxon and Hess have discovered more than 11 billion barrels of oil in place.
Namibia Success
Offshore Namibia, the success rate in discoveries has been phenomenal so far—companies have confirmed 15 discoveries of commercial volumes of oil or gas out of 17 exploration wells drilled since February 2022, the Financial Times notes.
“Overall, we see Namibia as an emerging core region for the Majors, with expected NPV for projects giving them the potential to become crown jewel assets for several big operators,” Ian Thom, Research Director, Upstream, at WoodMac, wrote in November.
Success in Namibia and European Big Oil’s pivot back to its core business of providing oil and gas from profitable projects are incentivizing more exploration activity.
UK supermajor BP is preparing to explore the Sau Brasil prospect in Brazil’s fringe pre-salt areas. Other majors – including Exxon, Chevron, Shell, Equinor, and China’s CNOOC – have recently given up exploration efforts in some of the pre-salt regions offshore Brazil.
In Uruguay, Brazil’s neighbor to the south, a subsidiary of Chevron entered in a deal this week to buy 60% and assume operatorship of an offshore exploration block. Chevron Uruguay Exploration Limited will acquire a 60% participating interest in the AREA OFF-1 block from Challenger Energy, and will assume operatorship of the block.
“We firmly believe that AREA OFF-1 holds enormous potential,” Challenger’s CEO Eytan Uliel said, adding that the company’s strategy for the block offshore Uruguay was “to introduce a larger industry player as operating partner, with a view to rapidly progressing the block via an accelerated 3D seismic campaign followed by, we hope, exploration well drilling.”
