Southern Africa: Chariot Oil & Gas to relinquish Northern Blocks 1811 A&B, offshore Namibia

AIM-listed Chariot Oil & Gas has announced that it has opted not to apply for a new exploration licence in the Northern Blocks 1811A&B, offshore Namibia, with the current licence due to lapse on the 26 October 2014.

The Chariot team has analysed significant amounts of proprietary seismic and well data, as well as integrated information from third party drilling activity to study the possibility for long range hydrocarbon migration to the Zamba Prospect. This work, however, has not significantly de-risked the prospect and, given that a new licence would entail significant additional investment both in capital and time, management considered it too high risk to justify further near term exploration expenditure. Whilst Chariot considers the acreage to remain prospective, this decision was made in line with the Company’s focus on portfolio management and capital discipline.

Larry Bottomley, CEO commented:

‘The goal of the Company is to deliver transformational growth through the discovery of material accumulations of hydrocarbons. Exploration is a risk business, and managing this risk will be key to our success. It is for this reason that Chariot views its fast follower positioning as crucial to its strategy, as this allows the Company to make informed decisions from an optimised knowledge base. Furthermore, with the diversity we now have in our portfolio, Chariot can manage its assets in terms of risk and their associated fit within the aspiration of zero cost exploration.

The Company will continue with this strict capital discipline and build on its asset base in order to maintain this optionality and generateopportunities for a sustainable drilling campaign. Namibia continues to be a key focus for Chariot as we believe this region has the potential to be a world-class hydrocarbon province. We remain excited about the prospectivity we see in our recently re-awarded Central and Southern licences which we aim to further de-risk as we progress with our exploration campaigns. (Source: Chariot Oil & Gas)