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Sierra Leone hopes to relaunch its licensing round in Q1 2019 following a change of leadership at the Petroleum Directorate. The round opened in January offering five newly delineated offshore blocks, including areas of undeveloped discoveries from previous drilling campaigns, shallow water and deep and ultra-deep water.

Malaysia’s Petronas is preparing to cease production at the Chinguetti field as part of the decommissioning process. Sterling Energy said on 26 January the abandonment and decommissioning project was awaiting final government approval. The plan consists of two phases, with cessation of production and temporary well suspension undertaken from early 2018 to Q2 2018, followed by final plugging and abandonment of the well stock in 2019-20.

Israeli miner Elenilto plans to acquire a 1,400km2 3D seismic survey over its Senegal Offshore Sud Shallow Block “within the next few months”. The company said an oil resource assessment, based on reprocessed 2D seismic and wells, suggested potential of more than 1.5bn barrels of oil. “About half of the resource is in first priority leads associated with shallow-water (12-26 metres) salt domes and deeper water (1,000-1,500 metres) shelf edge traps,” the company said. Elenilto said it had selected two target areas for further exploration.

Total has announced an oil discovery with the Ivoire-1X exploration well in block CI-100 close to the disputed maritime border with Ghana. The well was drilled to a total depth of 5,044 metres and encountered 28 metres of net oil pay in a series of about 100 metres of Cretaceous reservoirs. Ivoire-1X is Total’s first well in the block and reveals that the Tano Basin petroleum system extends into CI-100.

Reports that both the government of South Sudan and nominal opposition leader Riek Machar have been in talks with Khartoum over securing control of South Sudan’s oilfields have roused fears that the already bloody fight could escalate further. Speaking at Juba airport on 6 January at the conclusion of a visit by Sudan’s President Omar Al-Bashir, Sudan’s foreign minister Ali Ahmed Karti told reporters that the two countries were “in consultations” over a proposal from the South Sudanese government for the deployment of a “mixed force to protect oilfields in South Sudan”.

BG Tanzania has given UAE-based Stanford Marine a time-charter contract for the Stanford Buzzard platform

Dana Petroleum has announced a “new brand identity” aimed at helping it expand in Europe, the Middle East and Africa; Eve Howell has set up a new venture with Mauritania and Mali enthusiast Max de Vietri and Colombian geologist Ricardo Garzon, named EMR Resources; Vancouver-based Simba Energy has begun trading on the US over-the-counter market’s highest tier, the OTCQX, which aims to give international companies access to US investors

Big players, including BP and Petrobras, are piling into the Namibian offshore, finding themselves in partnership with some largely unknown local partners

Operator Chariot Oil & Gas has begun a 1,700km 2D seismic survey in its offshore Central blocks 2312 & 2412A. The survey is being acquired by SeaBird Exploration. Chariot and its partners have agreed to carry out a 2D survey to infill an existing grid of data to gain a better understanding of the regional prospectivity of the licence area, which covers approximately 16,800km2. This will enable Chariot to optimise the location and size of the 3D seismic programme required as a commitment during this current phase of exploration.

Tullow Ghana has given Technip, in consortium with Subsea7, two contracts for the Tweneboa-Enyenra-Ntomme (Ten) development. The contracts have a combined value of $1.23bn, with a Technip share of about $730m. Technip’s scope of work includes the engineering, fabrication and installation of nine flexible risers, three flexible flowlines and 12 flexible spools, totalling 48km; the engineering, fabrication and installation of 33km of water injection and gas injection rigid flowlines; installation of about 63km of static and dynamic umbilicals; engineering, prefabrication, final assembly and installation of ten rigid jumpers; and delivery of a further six prefabricated rigid jumpers.


The government plans to advertise at least five oil exploration licences repossessed from companies that failed to meet work programme obligations, according to mines and minerals development permanent secretary Paul Chanda. Currently, Zambia has 12 active exploration licences from the 17 it initially issued to foreign and local firms scouting for oil and gas in Africa’s second biggest copper producer.

Uganda has launched its first licensing round, offering six blocks in the Albertine Graben totalling 2,938km2. The blocks cover areas relinquished by Tullow, Total and CNOOC, and have seismic and well data, and in some cases smaller oil and gas discoveries. Energy and mineral development minister Irene Muloni told African Energy in November a key priority for the government in the bid round would be to encourage service providers to increase efficiency and push down costs, so as to minimise their cost recovery and maximise the state’s share.

The government has ratified an agreement for Canada’s Talisman Energy to take over the operatorship of Block SL-4B-10 (AE 231/13).

Move by the US major puts a couple of small players in an enviable position in one of the West Coast Transform Margin’s emerging E&P plays, writes Thalia Griffiths

London-based Solo Oil has said it plans to take up its option for a 12.5% interest in the Ruvuma production-sharing contract (PSC) in south-east Tanzania from Aminex subsidiary Ndovu Resources (AE 176/17).