Monitoring a geothermal motor
Following the drilling of successful exploration wells into the Kenyan Rift Valley in the 1970’s, the flagship Olkaria geothermal field has seen a steady development to a capacity of around…
Africa
New light oil discovery draws attention away from the Orange Basin central axis to northern promise
Reports continue to come in from the Namibia Orange Basin drilling campaigns of Shell, TotalEnergies and Galp, lighting up this enormous Cretaceous delta basin for future production potential. Shell are…
What could be behind the downgrade of Shell’s deep-water discoveries in Namibia?
This week, Namibia’s petroleum commissioner Maggy Shino announced that Shell has thus far discovered 200 million barrels of recoverable oil at Graff and 300 million barrels of recoverable oil at…
A deeper oil-bearing reservoir in the Gulf of Suez
In August, Cheiron announced the discovery of a 165 feet oil column in pre-Miocene Nubia Formation sandstones in exploration well GNN-11. The well was drilled into a fault block to…
From near misses to commercial success
The Horn of Africa, comprising Eritrea, Djibouti, Ethiopia and Somalia holds many ancient geological trends including the failed Karoo and Jurassic and Cretaceous rifts that record the fragmentation of Gondwana…
Somalia: The final frontier?
At the outset of a project in the area, one has to ask “Why does offshore Somalia remain unexplored?” It is one of the last undrilled frontier basins in the…
The source rock for Venus
Duncan Macgregor and his colleague Colin Reeves are working on a project that will result in the creation of a series of paleotectonic and paleogeographic maps of the African continent.…
Exploring the many facets of Africa’s geology on the back of world events
“You are not going to play around here for a month and do nothing”, said Keryn’s father when she returned home to Oranjemund (Namibia) from High School for the summer…
Grenadier, a turning point for Angola’s pre-salt play?
TotalEnergies is drilling Grenadier-1, on block 20/11 in the Kwanza basin offshore Angola. The Valaris DS-12 drillship is carrying out the work for TotalEnergies and partner Sonangol in 1500 m…
Unlocking African energy to power the future
It may not seem like it, but the last in-person GESGB/HGS Africa Conference was back in 2019. But the good news is that for 2023 we are back! The latest…
“Cryptic Seismic Clues: Hunting for another source rock in the South Atlantic”
Two for the price of one: Source rocks aplenty fuel South America’s next exploration frenzy Across the globe, explorers are waking from a disturbing dream where the oil and gas…
An analogue for Ephesus?
BP has just completed the Ephesus or Cape Creel exploration well off the northeast coast of Canada, which has unfortunately been reported dry. The main target of the well was…