26 March 2012, Sweetcrude, NAIROBI – UK’s Tullow Oil and Africa Oil Corporation of Canada have hit oil in their Ngamia-1 exploration well onshore Kenya. It is the first oil discovery in the east African country.
“This is the first time Kenya has made such a discovery and it is very good news,” Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki said on the development, according to Reuters report.
The well, located in the Turkana County block 10BB, encountered more than 20 metres of net oil pay.
The well was drilled to an intermediate depth of 1041 metres by the Weatherford 804 rig, and has now been successfully logged and sampled.
Announcing the discovery, Tullow Oil, which was also involved in Ghana’s as well as Uganda’s first oil discoveries, said that moveable oil with an API greater than 30 degrees had been recovered to surface that held similar properties to the light waxy crude it discovered in Uganda’s Lake Albert basin.
Reports said the UK independent’s shares were trading up by more than 6% at £15.68 on London’s main market in the wake of Monday’s announcement.
Shares of Africa Oil were among the Toronto Venture Exchange’s top gainers of the day meanwhile, rising as much as 58% to a near three-and-half year high of C$3.71.
The well was spudded in February and will now be drilled to a depth of around 2700 metres to explore for deeper potentials.
The Ngamia-1 well is the first of a multi-well drilling programme at the 10BB block and adjacent prospects.
“Many leads and prospects similar to Ngamia have been identified and following this discovery the outlook for further success has been significantly improved,” Tullow Oil said on Monday’s find.
Listed in London, Dublin and Ghana, Tullow Oil is Africa’s leading independent with more than 90 licences in 22 countries producing 58,100 barrels of oil equivalent per day net to Tullow in 2010.
Tullow also has assets in Europe, south Asia and South America.
Africa Oil Corporation is a Toronto-listed explorer with assets in Kenya, Ethiopia and Mali as well as Somalia through its 51% equity interest in Horn Petroleum Corporation.
