28 February 2013 – Australian explorer FAR said a new technical assessment of its assets offshore Africa has yielded a prospective resource estimate of about 7 billion barrels of oil.
FAR managing director Cath Norman said on Wednesday that the company was very keen to start drilling on its blocks off Kenya and Senegal before the end of the year.
“The prospective resources that have now been identified in our Senegalese and Kenya L6 projects are much larger than we originally assessed,” she said in a statement, adding that there had been no oil and gas drilling off Senegal’s coast for more than 40 years and none in FAR’s Kenyan block for 20 years.
“Modern seismic data and other new technologies clearly indicate very strong potential in these areas and we are aiming to drill in these blocks before year end.”
FAR’s 60%-owned and operated L6 permit off the coast of Kenya has been estimated to hold gross unrisked prospective resources of 3.7 billion barrels of oil or 10.2 trillion cubic feet of gas. This estimate includes three matured prospects – Tembo, Kifaru and Kifaru West – which have been estimated to hold 327 million, 178 million and 130 million barrels of oil, respectively.
The first exploration well location on Block L6 will be selected shortly, the company said.
In addition, 11 prospects located in FAR’s offshore Senegal blocks are expected to range in potential size from 58 million to 632 million barrels of oil, with combined unrisked prospective resources estimated at 3.58 barrels.
“Success in exploration drilling on any of the above prospects in Senegal or Kenya will substantially improve the probability of success in the remaining prospects. We are very keen to start drilling on these targets,” Norman said.
*Danica Newman, Upstream
