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Parliament is considering a put-call option agreement to underwrite the expanded 400MW Bridge Power combined cycle gas plant. The project involves an initial 144MW open-cycle plant at Tema, available within six months of contract signing and operating using liquid petroleum gas. Developers are Endeavor Energy, Sage Petroleum and GE.

Kosmos Energy has announced a “significant, play-opening gas discovery” with the Tortue-1 exploration well in offshore Block C-8. The well, drilled in 2,700 metres of water to test the Tortue West prospect which forms part of the Greater Tortue Complex, intersected 107 metres of net hydrocarbon pay. A single gas pool was encountered in the primary Lower Cenomanian objective, comprised of three high-quality reservoirs totalling 88 metres in thickness over a gross hydrocarbon bearing interval of 161 metres.

A tender for domestic use of gas from the Rovuma Basin has produced three project awards, but bidders say timelines and gas sources have yet to be clarified. Fourteen bids were submitted in November for the tender, which was issued on 27 August (AE 339/16).The National Petroleum Institute (INP) told African Energy that successful bidders will now negotiate memoranda of understanding with the government which will set out more clearly the terms and structure of the projects, including whether national utility Electricidade de Moçambique (EDM), which bid unsuccessfully, will be involved as a shareholder.

Oando plc hopes to complete asset sales by end-July to reduce its debt to more manageable levels and enable it to focus on developing its upstream business following the acquisition of ConocoPhillips’ Nigerian assets. “We are optimising our balance sheet by restructuring our existing debt facilities and deleveraging an estimated $350m in asset value,” Oando Energy Resources chief executive Pade Durotoye told African Energy in an interview. He said the company was selling 60% of the downstream business, 75% of its gas and power business, and the entire rigs operation.

Eni’s floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel Armada Olombendo has arrived at Block 15/06 ready for next year’s start-up of the East Hub development project. The vessel was built at Keppel shipyard in Singapore for Malaysian FPSO operator Bumi Armada. Eni held a naming ceremony there on 14 October.

The existential threat to facilities in the Sirte Basin is growing while the prospects for a rapid, if partial, political solution to Libya’s crisis are diminishing. A second wave of attacks carried out by Islamic State (IS, or Daesh) on the Ras Lanuf and Sidra oil export terminals on 21 January has demonstrated definitively that the jihadist organisation intends to destroy oil production capability rather than exploiting it for commercial gain.

Globeleq and Industrial Promotion Services (West Africa) announced on 22 February that they had reached financial close on the 253MW expansion of the Azito gas power plant. The plant currently has 460MW and following the expansion, known as phase IV, Azito will account for around 30% of the country’s installed capacity. Construction has begun and first power is expected this year. Azito Phase IV will add a 181MW gas turbine and 72MW steam turbine to the plant, operating in combined cycle.

A joint venture of France’s Sofregaz and Denmark’s Ramboll has won an international tender for the selection of a technical adviser for a planned scheme to import liquefied natural gas to supply new power plants. Office Nationale de l’Electricité et de l’Eau Potable said bids were submitted in December. The government plans to import 5bcm/yr of gas to supply 2.4GW of new combined-cycle gas turbine capacity to be installed in 2020-25 under its gas-to-power road map. With a similar amount to be installed in the following five years, 10bcm/yr will be needed in 2025-30.

Victoria Oil & Gas (VOG) has signed a non-binding term sheet with Turkey’s Aksa Enerji to supply up to 25mcf/d of gas to a planned 150MW power station in Bekoko, Douala. The term sheet, announced on 29 July, is subject to various conditions, including government approvals and the signing of a power purchase agreement between Aksa and distribution utility Eneo Cameroon or Sonatrel, the government-owned manager of the national grid.

Ghana’s 7 December election came at a critical juncture for the country. Outgoing president John Dramani Mahama and his National Democratic Congress government have left a mixed legacy, with numerous energy projects of varying quality and national utilities in dire need of reform. His successor, Nana Akufo-Addo, of the more business-oriented New Patriotic Party (NPP) inherits a sector in which key decisions over future gas supply, the generation mix and the reform of state utilities will need to be made.

Symbion Energy and Highland Group Holdings Ltd (HGHL) signed an agreement on 21 September under which HGHL will invest $100m in Symbion’s $370m of projects to generate a total of 106MW from methane gas dissolved in Lake Kivu. This will be the first major investment in Africa for HGHL, which has interests in wind power and owns the House of Fraser department store group.

London-based Aminex has appointed io oil & gas consulting, a joint venture of GE Oil & Gas and McDermott, to prepare a gas commercialisation study for the development of the Ntorya field. The study is designed to identify gas monetisation options, including potential early development facilities to supply the local market and enable near-term revenue generation. The Ntorya-2 appraisal well was drilled earlier this year and suspended for future production.

Following concerns that political indecision and potentially competing projects might significantly delay Morocco’s estimated $4.6bn integrated liquefied natural gas (LNG) and gas-to-power (GTP) scheme, further advisory contracts will be signed soon and key decisions are expected by year-end, Energy, Mines and Sustainable Development Ministry secretary-general and deputy minister Abderrahim El-Hafidi said on 7 June.

Angola LNG (ALNG) said on 6 June that production has resumed at its liquefaction plant at Soyo and the first liquefied natural gas (LNG) cargo since its April 2014 shutdown has been loaded. The cargo is being sold by an international tender. Reuters quoted traders as saying the cargo was loaded between 3 and 5 June on board the Sonangol Sambizanga tanker and bid submissions are due on the morning of 13 June.

Apparently enraged by the Energy and Water Utilities Regulatory Authority (Ewura) decision on 29 December to approve an 8.53% increase in the power tariff – substantially less than the 18.19% increase Tanesco requested in its October application and on the back of a small price cut in April 2016 – President John Magufuli ordered the decision to be overturned and sacked Tanesco managing director Felchesmi Mramba on New Year’s Day. Magufuli said in a statement: “It’s unacceptable that while we are making plans to build manufacturing industries and ensure more citizens have access to electricity... that someone else uses his position to increase power tariffs.”