sergio gonçalves
LISBON (Reuters) – Portuguese oil company Galp Energia said on Sunday it had completed the first phase of exploration at the Mopane field off Namibia, estimating it could hold at least 10 billion barrels of oil. Announced.
Gulp said it conducted test operations at the Mopane 1X well in January and the Mopane 2X well in March. The report said “significant columns of light oil were discovered in high-quality reservoir sands” at both wells, which are eight kilometers apart.
The Mopane field is located in the Orange Basin along the coast of southern Africa, where Shell and France's Total Energy have made several oil and gas discoveries.
Gulp said the flow rates achieved during the trial reached the maximum allowable limit of 14,000 barrels per day, making Mopane a potentially commercially significant discovery.
“The Mopane complex alone has an estimated hydrocarbon yield of more than 10 billion barrels of oil equivalent before drilling additional exploration and appraisal wells,” Gulp said.
Gulp holds an 80% stake in Petroleum Exploration License 83 (PEL 83), which covers an area of approximately 10,000 square kilometers in the Orange Basin.
Namibia could be a new source of income for Gulp. Galp currently has strong investments offshore Brazil and is also involved in a natural gas project in Mozambique's Rovuma Basin.
Gulp has previously indicated that it may begin the process of attracting other investors as the project in Namibia could be large-scale.
The OPEC+ oil-producing group, which has lost Angola and other members in recent years, is aiming to add Namibia, which could become Africa's fourth-largest oil producer by the next 10 years, an African industry official said. told Reuters.
(Reporting by Sergio Gonçalves; Editing by Christina Fincher)
