Namibia has said that following several offshore oil discoveries in recent months, its economy stands the chance of doubling in the next two decades.
Namibia’s head of the National Petroleum Corporation of Namibia (NAMCOR) told Bloomberg yesterday that since the beginning of the year, oil majors Shell and TotalEnergies announced discoveries offshore of the country.
“More than 30 years of exploration and we finally we hit the jackpot. At peak, these two discoveries could bring $5.6 billion to a very small economy,” the agency quoted NAMCORS’s chairperson, Jennifer Comalie.
The economy of the south African country, who are neighbours to the OPEC big time producer Angola, is currently valued at around $11 billion.
Bloomberg said Namibia could begin production around 2030 or a little bit earlier if appraisals for the recent discoveries support initial estimates and, of course, majors commit to developing those discoveries while they look to become net-zero energy companies by 2050.
The report noted that in April, Shell said it was “very encouraged” by the early results from the deep-water Graff-1 exploration well completed earlier this year.
“Over the coming months, we’ll need to conduct further evaluation of the well results, and additional exploration activity, in order to determine the size and recoverable potential of the hydrocarbons that were identified,” the report quoted Shell’s country chair in Namibia.
Shell also made a second discovery in the Orange basin in April. In the same basin offshore southern Namibia, TotalEnergies reportedly made a significant discovery of light oil with associated gas on the Venus prospect, the French supermajor said in February this year.
TotalEnergies also needs to proceed with appraisal drilling operations in the area in order to assess the commercial prospects for the discovery.
“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” senior vice president, TotalEnergies exploration, Kevin McLachlan was quoted.
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