HOUSTON, Feb. 8 -- South Africa granted final approval to a prospecting sublease agreement for Block 3B/4B to Global Offshore Oil Exploration South Africa Pty. Ltd., a wholly owned affiliate of Global Energy Holdings LLC, Littleton, Colo.
Previously, Global conducted a technical cooperation agreement for the area (OGJ Online, Aug. 7, 2000).
The agreement involves the Ministry of Minerals and Energy and the South African Agency for Promotion of Petroleum Exploration & Exploitation (Pty.) Ltd., called Petroleum Agency SA.
The 7.5-year term of the agreement is divided into four periods. The first one is to last 18 months and involves acquisition of new seismic data. The three remaining periods are optional.
Block 3B/4B covers 7.1 million acres off western South Africa in 300-1,200 m of water.
Randall C. Thompson, managing director of Global, said, "Global is targeting a new oil play concept in deeper waters which has not yet been tested in the Orange basin." He said recent seismic reprocessing has confirmed a very large prospective structure, dubbed Pinotage prospect.
Pinotage apparently covers 67,400 acres in 600 m of water.
Thompson said, "Global intends for Block 3B/4B's test well to be the first ever deepwater exploration well drilled offshore western South Africa to test for oil in turbidite sandstones, similar to other prolific successes further north on the western African coast."
Petroleum Geo-Services ASA and Petroleum Agency SA recently said they will cooperate to promote deepwater exploration acreage in the Orange basin off western South Africa. The two companies will acquire and market 2D seismic data and interpret new and reprocessed data (OGJ Online, Feb. 7, 2002).
