Page 13 - AfrOil Week 39 2022

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Some sources have put forth even higher fig- to become “a hot spot” for exploration drilling
ures. In late April, Upstream Online quoted over the next few years. “[It] won’t necessarily
three sources familiar with recent analyses of be a frenzy, but there will be a lot more wells,” he
data collected from Venus-1x as saying that the was quoted as saying by Offshore Engineer. ™
field’s recoverable reserves might be as large as
13bn barrels of oil equivalent (boe), including
more than 10bn barrels of crude oil plus 10-20
trillion cubic feet (283.2-566.4bn cubic metres)
of gas. (The sources did not specify whether the
latter was natural or associated gas.)
As mentioned, Venus is not the only find in
Namibia’s deepwater zone. Shell’s Graff-1 well is
also thought to contain at least 1bn barrels of oil
in recoverable reserves, though no official fig-
ures have been made public.
This potential led Dr. Andrew Latham, Wood
Mackenzie’s vice president for energy research,
to say in June that he expected the Orange basin Venus-1x and Graff-1 were drilled at adjacent blocks (Image: Wildcat Petroleum)

Invictus Energy spuds maiden

exploration well in Zimbabwe

ZIMBABWE ASX-LISTED Invictus Energy announced by Baobab-1, which will test an independent
on September 26 that it had started explor- play along the basin margin in the EPO 1849
atory drilling for gas and oil at its acreage in block and take approximately 30 to 40 days to
north-eastern Zimbabwe. complete. The second well will target stacked
The spudding of the first well, Mukuyu-1, Cretaceous and younger sandstones, within
on September 23 targets 20 trillion cubic feet four-way and three-way dip closures, against
(566.4bn cubic metres) and 845mn barrels of the southern basin bounding rift fault.
conventional gas-condensate of the onshore “This is an exciting and long-anticipated
Cabora Bassa Basin. Mukuyu-1 is designed moment for Invictus and our shareholders,”
to target several stacked Triassic and younger commented managing director, Scott Mac-
sandstones within a 200-square km four-way millan. “Invictus, together with our partners,
dip closure on the basement high trend. have methodically de-risked and matured the
One of the largest oil and gas explora- Mukuyu prospect and our Cabora Bassa acreage
tion prospects to be drilled globally in 2022, over the last several years and the commence-
Mukuyu-1 will be drilled to a projected depth ment of our drilling campaign is a significant
of 3.5km. Drilling and evaluation of the well is milestone. Mukuyu-1 is a world-class, basin
expected to take 50 to 60 days to complete. opening well which, if successful, could be trans-
Invictus said that Mukuyu-1 will be followed formative for the company and Zimbabwe.”

Invictus is using Exalo Rig 202 to sink the Mukuyu-1 exploration well (Photo: Invictus Energy)

Week 39 29•September•2022 www. NEWSBASE .com P13