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Africa Oil & Gas: Tullow Oil spuds Cormorant-1 well in PEL 37 offshore Namibia
JV partner Pancontinental Oil & Gas has announced that operator Tullow Oilhas spudded the Cormorant-1 well in Petroleum Exploration Licence 37 (‘PEL 37’) offshore the Republic of Namibia. Pancontinental holds a 20% effective interest in PEL 37 and was the originator of the project, and initial Operator prior to a farmout to Tullow. PEL 37 covers an area of 17,295 sq kms in the Walvis Basin offshore Namibia.
Cormorant-1 is being drilled by the Ocean Rig Poseidon, a 6th Generation drillship, in 545 meters of water, to a total depth of 3,830 meters subsea. The well will test the oil potential of a mid-Cretaceous marine turbidite ‘fan’ sandstone system. Drilling and evaluation of the well is expected to take about 34 days.
In 2013, the Wingat-1 and Murombe-1 wells, directly south of PEL 37, confirmed high quality mature oil-prone source rocks in the Walvis Basin. The Cormorant Prospect, mapped using high-quality 3D seismic data, is one of four submarine fan prospects identified so far in the block and interpreted to be charged by the same source rocks.
The Cormorant Prospect has gross best estimate prospective recoverable resource potential of 124 million barrels of oil and, if successful, would open a fairway of similar fans, potentially creating a substantial spread of resources across PEL 37. The total estimated oil potential of the four main Prospects mapped so far in PEL 37 is 915 million barrels of oil. Additional potential exists in large ‘Leads’ that have also been identified.
Pancontinental Oil & Gas owns two thirds of Pancontinental Namibia, which holds a 30% participating interest in PEL 37, giving it a 20% effective interest in PEL 37. Now that drilling has commenced, Pancontinental will receive cash of US$5.5 million (A$7.5 million) from Africa Energy Corp.
The participants in Cormorant-1 are: Tullow Namibia (Operator) 35.00%; Pancontinental Namibia 30.00% *; ONGC Videsh Limited 30.00%; Paragon Oil & Gas 5.00%.
* Ownership of Pancontinental Namibia: Pancontinental Oil & Gas 66.67%; Africa Energy Corp. 33.33%. Source: Pancontinental Oil & Gas