Deepwater, land discoveries high-grade East African margin

04/02/2012

By Alan Petzet 

Chief Editor

World-class deepwater natural gas discoveries offshore in the Indian Ocean have turned the East African margin into one of the planet's hottest exploration theaters.

Early exploratory wells have uncovered gross gas volumes approaching 100 tcf in place when the operators' high estimates are combined.

The industry holds licenses in force along a front of more than 800 miles offshore northern Mozambique, Tanzania, and Kenya (Fig. 1). Drilling density is sparse in the southern part of the trend and extremely light in the north