TotalEnergies announces ‘significant’ discovery offshore Namibia

TotalEnergies has announced a ‘significant’ discovery of light oil with associated gas offshore southern Namibia at the Venus prospect, located in Block 2913B in the Orange Basin.

The Venus-1x well, its wildcat exploration well in the PEL 56 licence area, encountered approximately 84 metres of net oil pay in a good quality Lower Cretaceous reservoir, the French energy major announced on February 24.

“This discovery offshore Namibia and the very promising initial results prove the potential of this play in the Orange Basin, on which TotalEnergies owns an important position both in Namibia and South Africa,” said Kevin McLachlan, senior vice-president exploration at TotalEnergies.

“A comprehensive coring and logging programme has been completed. This will enable the preparation of appraisal operations designed to assess the commerciality of this discovery.”

Venus-1x lies within a licence area that is also known as Block 2913B, which covers approximately 8,215 square km in deep offshore Namibia. Seismic data indicate that the block may be home to a reservoir that covers an area of around 600 square km.

TotalEnergies is the operator, with a 40% working interest, alongside QatarEnergy (30%), Impact Oil and Gas (20%) and National Petroleum Co. of Namibia (NAMCOR), which has 10%.

TotalEnergies had not previously commented on the status of the Venus-1x well, which is being drilled in 3,000-metre-deep water. However, anonymous industry sources told Upstream in mid-February that initial results from 1x suggested it had tapped into a very large hydrocarbon structure within the Orange Basin.

One source described early results from the well as “very, very encouraging” and indicative that TotalEnergies was drilling into “a very thick reservoir” of crude oil and natural gas.

Meanwhile, another source speculated that Venus might turn out to be even larger than Graff, a field located directly to the east where Shell (UK) struck oil in January 2022. UK-based consultancy Wood Mackenzie has speculated that Graff may contain as much as 700mn barrels of oil, while others have estimated the field’s reserves at 500mn barrels.

Douglas Rycroft, director at Gneiss Energy, told NewsBase that the Venus and Graff discoveries could be a watershed moment for the development of Namibia’s oil and gas sector.

He said: “Like proverbial buses, [it] has taken a long time for the industry to make significant progress offshore Namibia and now we have two success stories within a matter of weeks. This morning’s news from TotalEnergies that Venus 1-X well encountered approximately 84 metres of net oil pay in a good quality Lower Cretaceous reservoir follows closing on the heels of Shells Graff discovery in January.”

Rycroft added that the industry has long placed its bets on the prospectivity of Namibia and to date “it’s been a tough investment environment; however, perseverance has paid off and the read through for those who have retained their acreage on a relatively low-cost basis should reap the rewards for their patience. TotalEnergies and Shell, along with their respective joint venture partners, will now move quickly to appraise their finds, and whilst there will be inevitable competition of the neighbouring discoveries, synergies on logistics, supply chain and development should be a huge positive seeing cost savings and improved economics across the board.”