Petroleum Africa
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Monday, August 11, 2014
Africa Oil Corp. updated its East African operations in its recently released Q2 report. At the outset of 2013 the company and its partners in Ethiopia and Kenya had seven rigs busy at work; four Tullow-Africa Oil JV rigs are operating in northern Kenya on Blocks 10BB and 13T, one of which is a testing and completions unit. In addition, the company and its partner have a rig operating in Block 9 in Kenya.
In Ethiopia, it and its partners in the South Omo Block and Block 7/8, had rigs operating in each block during Q2. Drilling operations in Block 7/8 have been completed, and the rig has been released. Additionally, drilling operations in the South Omo Block have been completed and the rig is being de-mobilized while future drilling opportunities are being assessed.
Africa Oil said it plans to have five drilling rigs operating in Kenya through the remainder of 2014.
Moving forward the company’s outlook had it focusing, in the near-term, on drilling out the remaining prospect inventory in the discovered basin in northern Kenya, appraising existing and future discoveries with the aid of the new 3D seismic survey, drilling three new basin opening wells in H2, and progressing the development studies towards project sanction in the discovered basin in northern Kenya.
Given the significant volumes discovered and the extensive exploration and appraisal program planned to fully assess the upside potential of the basin, the Tullow-Africa Oil JV has agreed with the government of Kenya to commence development studies. In addition, the partnership is involved in a comprehensive pre-FEED study of the export pipeline.
The current ambition of the government of Kenya and the JV partnership is to reach project sanction for development, including an export pipeline, by the end of 2015/early 2016. The governments of Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda have signed a MoU and formed a Steering Committee to progress a regional crude oil export pipeline from Uganda through Kenya. The Kenya upstream partners have also signed a cooperation agreement with the Uganda upstream partners in support of the same objective.
Keith Hill, President and CEO of Africa Oil, commented, “We are looking forward to the results of three new basin opening wells to be drilled in the second half of 2014 which have the potential to unlock significant value in terms of new prospects and resources. The ongoing drilling in the discovered basin in Northern Kenya has been quite helpful in understanding the distribution of the best reservoir facies and will no doubt be enhanced by the ongoing 3D seismic survey. We remain very bullish in not only the existing discoveries but in the remaining prospects in the discovered basin in Northern Kenya. Our goal is to open up at least one new basin and to move a significant number of barrels from prospective to contingent resources by the end of 2014 as we move the field development program forward.”
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