Mozambique crude oil discovery changes Tanzanian prospects- analysts

Mozambique crude oil discovery changes Tanzanian prospects- analysts

28th August 10
Mozambique crude oil discovery changes Tanzanian prospects- analysts

The Guardian Reporter

Confirmation of the presence of crude oil in Mozambican deep sea waters, which is only 20 kilometers away from Tanzanian waters, changes prospects in Tanzania, according to analysts.
The nation’s deep sea oil and gas prospecting blocks in the south eastern Indian Ocean which were thought to be gas fields could indeed be crude oil reservoirs, Offshore Magazine has asserted in an article published on August 19.
Cove Energy, the company prospecting for oil and gas in Mozambique in collaboration with the company Anadarko, announced that the Ironclad-1 drilled by Belford Dolphin some 110 kilometers south of the Windjammer gas discovery appeared to be a crude oil discovery in Mozambique.
It is the first documented discovery of liquid hydrocarbons offshore East Africa.

The well penetrated 38 meters of oil and gas saturated sands from an extensive Cretaceous deep water fan complex, the company reported, adding that there were substantial gas shows throughout the 205 meters of Cretaceous. The well was drilled to 5,304 meters depth.
The Windjammer well is about 20 kilometers south of the Tanzanian line. Thus Ironclad-1 looks to be 130 km south of Tanzanian waters. This will encourage the Ophir/ BG Group, in Tanzania’s blocks 1,3 and 4 of the Mafia Deepwater Basin offshore Mafia Island in deep waters as they gather exploration momentum in the area, Offshore Magazine analysts have said.
The Odfjell Drilling Company's dynamically positioned semi-submersible Deepsea Stavanger is expected to arrive on its first Tanzanian location during August. This is a brand new rig built by Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine from South Korea.
Two firm wells are planned with options for a third.

The east coastal region of Tanzania has long been considered highly prospective.
A Western Geophysical high resolution seismic survey conducted prior to Tanzania's licensing round of 2000 identified a number of structures in the Mafia deepwater basin.
Oil seeps exist on Pemba Island and oil appeared in shallow shot holes on Mafia island itself. So a confirmation by the Ironclad-1 wildcat that an oil structure exists is good news indeed.
Although gas and oil can exist in the same area, Tanzania’s south-east offshore license area is known to be a æstrictly natural gas area.
Aminex, the British oil and gas prospecting company working in conjunction with another British company, Tullow Oil Plc to prospect for oil and gas in the Indian Ocean within TanzaniaÆs south eastern territorial waters says the evidence now available proves the deep sea license area to be a strictly natural gas area with oil indications present only on the mainland.
Briefing shareholders in London recently, company officials said data currently available showed oil was present somewhere onshore while evidence indicated the offshore Tanzania license was a gas play.
But the temperature exploration in this area is high nonetheless.

The British company Key Petroleum recently announced they will resume drilling for oil and gas in the offshore Nyuni licence area in December, six years after halting drilling operations there. The exploration license is in the same vicinity as the Tullow-Aminex blocks.
Partners in the Nyuni joint venture offshore Tanzania have opted to drill the Nyuni 2 exploration well in December, where the well will be drilled directionally from Nyuni Island in the northeast of the Nyuni block to a subsurface target 1.47 km (9.6 mi) to the east, beyond the edge of the continental shelf, the company said in a recent press release.
Key Petroleum says the well will test a very large anticlinal closure drilled by the Nyuni 1 well in 2003-04, which discovered a 15-m (49-ft) gas column in Albina-Aptian sandstone. However, the gas-bearing zone could not be flow tested at the time due to operational factors.

THE GUARDIAN
Mozambique crude oil discovery changes Tanzanian prospects- analysts