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Somalia’s Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral early 1990s into production-sharing agreements
Resources had said earlier this year that the (PSAs). Somali officials had hoped to conclude
bidding process would cover the licence areas these discussions by the end of 2020 but will not
known as Blocks 152, 153, 164, 165, 177, 178 be able to meet this deadline because of the pan-
and 204. It described these blocks as “among the demic, he commented. Once the parties are able
most prospective areas for hydrocarbon explo- to strike a deal, though, Shell and ExxonMobil
rations and production in Somalia.” will be able to proceed with exploration work,
Hussein confirmed in an interview with he said. ™
Reuters last week that SPA was offering only
these seven blocks to investors, rather than the
15 blocks originally slated for auction. He stated
that the number had been reduced because of
“capacity constraints,” saying that Somalia was
keen to ensure more effective management of
exploration processes. (The news agency noted,
though, that the selection had also been influ-
enced by the country’s ongoing dispute with
Kenya over the maritime border between the
two neighbouring countries.)
The SPA chief went on to say that his agency
was still in talks with Royal Dutch Shell (UK/
Netherlands) and ExxonMobil (US) on the con-
version of concession agreements signed in the The licensing round will include seven blocks (Image: Spectrum Geo)

PERFORMANCE
Orca seeking to sustain gas

production at Songo Songo field

TANZANIA CANADA-BASED Orca Energy Group is tak- remained fairly steady at the Songo Songo field
ing steps to shore up production levels at Songo since the advent of the coronavirus (COVID-19)
Songo, a natural gas field offshore Tanzania. pandemic. It also noted, though, that gas sales
In a statement, the company said it hoped had declined year on year in the second quarter
to achieve this aim by installing new compres- of 2020 and in the first half of the year.
sion units at the gas-processing facility that In the April-June period, the company sold
handles production from the offshore field. an average of 50.6mn cubic feet (1.434mn cubic
It explained that it had signed a contract with metres) per day of gas from Songo Songo, down
China Petroleum and Technology Development by 1-.6% on the figure of 56.6 mmcf (1.6 mcm)
Co. (CPTDC) for the design, supply, installation per day reported for the same period of 2019.
and commissioning of these compressors at the Between January and June, it sold 53.5 mmcf
Songas gas-processing plant, which is located on (1.51 mcm) per day, down by 10.1% on the fig-
Songo Songo Island. ure of 59.5 mmcf (1.68 mcm) per day reported
CPTDC is due to make the new units opera- for the first half of last year.
tional by the end of the second quarter of 2022,
Orca said. “The compressors will work in har-
mony with the previously installed refrigera-
tion to address declining reservoir pressure and
ensure [that] maximum production levels can
be sustained, subject to demand, through to the
end of the production-sharing agreement [PSA]
in 2026,” it added.
The company put the total value of the con-
tract with the Chinese contractor at $38mn. It
said it had already incurred around $6mn in
costs in 2019 and expected to spend another
$19mn by the end of this year.
Orca went on to say that production rates had Orca will install compressors at Songas (Image: Orca Energy Group)

Week 32 12•August•2020 www. NEWSBASE .com P13