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Engie subsidiary Ausar Energy has launched construction of a 400kW solar-thermal hybrid plant at Ndjolé in Moyen-Ogooué province. The plant is the first of eight planned solar hybrid plants with a combined capacity of 2.2MW being developed under an agreement signed between Engie and Gabonese financial institution Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations (CDC) in August 2018.

Lagos-based infrastructure financier Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) has increased its stake in the Gabon Special Economic Zone (GSEZ) as part of a restructuring bringing in transport and logistics specialist AP Moller Capital as a new investor to expand the project into West Africa. The AFC said the GSEZ had been reorganised into three separate companies: Arise Port & Logistics (P&L), Arise Integrated Industrial Platforms, and Arise infrastructure Services. Arise P&L is now owned by AP Moller Capital, Singapore agribusiness company Olam International, and AFC.

Construction of the 34MW Kinguélé Aval hydropower plant on the Mbéi River in north-western Gabon is scheduled to start in Q2 2020 following the signing of a concession contract in late October. France-based investment fund Meridiam announced on 24 October the signing of a 33-year concession contract with the government for the run-of-river power project, which is to be developed in consortium with state investment fund Le Fonds Gabonais d’Investissements Stratégiques (FGIS).

BW Offshore’s DHIBM-1 well on the Dussafu licence has encountered hydrocarbons in the main well bore. Announcing its H1 results on 30 August, the company said well logging was continuing and a sidetrack well was planned. The main aim of the well, which targeted the Hibiscus prospect, was to find more resources in the Greater Ruche area.

BW Energy has spudded an exploration well on the Hibiscus Updip prospect on the Dussafu Marin permit. Partner Panoro Energy said the well, being drilled with the Borr Norve jackup rig, was the first well in a six-well campaign planned on Dussafu in 2019-20. The Hibiscus Updip well (DHIBM-1) is planned as a vertical well to test the Gamba and Dentale reservoirs at a site about 56km offshore Gabon in a water depth of 116 metres.

Seadrill Partners has secured a one-well contract with Petronas subsidiary PC Gabon Upstream SA for the West Polaris to work offshore Gabon. Work is expected to start in September 2019, running to the end of the year.Petronas operates the Likuale (F14) Block offshore southern Gabon, where the Boudji-1 well drilled in Q4 2018 intersected a 90-metre oil and gas column in water depths of 2,800 metres.

Gabon Oil Company (GOC) has agreed to take a 10% paying interest in the Dussafu production-sharing contract. The state oil company will pay $28.5m, representing its share of past production costs from April 2017 to date.Operator BW Offshore said GOC would contribute to cash calls for the development and production of the field and adhere to the joint operating agreement and lifting arrangements that are currently in force.

Gabon’s Direction Générale des Hydrocarbures (DGH) has insisted “everything is back to normal” following a coup attempt on 7 January. DGH deputy general manager Edgard Mbina-Kombila told a roadshow event in London on 17 January that the closing date for the country’s 12th licensing round had been put back to 30 September following industry feedback suggesting the previous closing date of 22 April was too soon. But the revised petroleum code governing the bid round has not yet been signed into law and bid evaluation criteria are still being worked out.

Gabon Special Economic Zone has issued the first CFAF14.3bn ($24.6m) tranche of its CFAF33bn corporate bond programme, which is intended to finance investment in logistics infrastructure. The facility is guaranteed by Private Infrastructure Development Group member GuarantCo, which said it was the “first ten-year tenor local currency infrastructure bond in Gabon, the Cemac region and Francophone Africa”.

BW Offshore successfully offloaded a first cargo of oil from the BW Adolo floating production, storage and offloading vessel (FPSO) on the Dussafu licence on 2 December. A total of 550,000 barrels of oil were transferred from the FPSO to a tanker, which will transport the crude oil to a refinery. The BW Adolo achieved first oil from the Tortue field offshore Gabon on 16 September after completing hook-up of mooring systems and installation of risers and umbilicals.

Norway’s BW Offshore has made a final investment decision for phase 2 of the Tortue development on the Dussafu licence following a successful appraisal programme on the western flank of the Tortue field. Phase 2 includes drilling of four additional horizontal development wells.

Gabon has launched a licensing round to be governed by a revised petroleum code currently under preparation. Oil minister Pascal Houangni Ambouroue told the Africa Oil Week conference in Cape Town on 7 November the round would offer 12 blocks in shallow water and 23 blocks in deep water. Bids are due by 22 April.Roadshows will be held on 5 January in Houston, on 15 January in London and on 19 February in Singapore, and the round will also be promoted at the African Petroleum Producers Organisation Cape VII conference in Malabo on 1-5 April.

Eranove announced on 26 October that it had signed power purchase agreements (PPAs) for the 73MW Ngoulmendjim and 15MW Dibwangui hydroelectric power projects. Eranove, a developer backed by Emerging Capital Partners, has partnered with state investment fund Fonds Gabonais d’Investissements Stratégiques (FGIS) for the projects and the pair began prequalifying companies to build Ngoulmendjim last month.

Canadian Natural Resources (CNR) has terminated the contract for the Knock Allan floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel three months early as it winds down activity at the Olowi field. Malaysia’s Yinson Holdings said the FPSO contract was entered into on 30 November 2006 for a fixed primary term of ten years, from 1 May 2009 to 30 April 2019.

France’s Eranove Group, in partnership with state investment fund Fonds Gabonais d’Investissements Stratégiques (FGIS), has invited expressions of interest to construct the Ngoulmendjim storage plant. Prequalification bids are sought by 31 October for the design and construction of the project, which will be located on the Komo River, about 125km east of Libreville in the north-western province of Estuaire.The work is divided into three lots, to be awarded under a single engineering procurement and construction contract.