South Africa
Offshore / Exploration
Envoi has been engaged by New Age African Global Energy (‘NewAge’) to assist in the search for a new partner to join in the exploration of the large Algoa-Gamtoos Licence, offshore South Africa, which NewAge operates in 50/50 partnership with London-listed Tower Resources plc.
The 7,914 km2 acreage straddles the Algoa and Gamtoos Basins, positioned at the eastern end of a series of en-echelon petroleum basins on the southern shelf margin of South Africa, which developed during the Jurassic break-up and separation of southern Africa from the Falkland Plateau of South America.
Recent geological reviews have shown that the true hydrocarbon prospectivity of the area has been largely unexplored by the drill bit, as historical wells were located using old 2D data and did not intersect valid closure or encountered only modestly developed reservoir sands at the fringes of the main depocentres. Many of these old wells drilled in both the Algoa and Gamtoos Basins, however, either had shows, residual hydrocarbons and/or penetrated and confirmed three mature, wet gas to oil prone shale source sequences of up to 4% TOC. Two of these source units lie within the Jurassic Early Syn-Rift fill and one within the subsequent Cretaceous Rift-Drift succession. Basin modelling by IGI confirms they are mature in both central basin play areas.
NewAges’ most recent evaluation has redefined three primary play trends that the Group’s forward exploration plan will focus on, comprising:
Syn Rift Play in the Gamtoos Basin: stacked Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous rift fill on the shelf in the west of the acreage (comprising shallow marine, lacustrine and fluvial deposits) have been structured by early faulting, remain untested by any wells and require 3D seismic data to mature leads into drillable prospects.
Post Rift Passive Margin Play: on the South Outeniqua Basin Flank, Cretaceous-age deep marine channel and fan systems fed by canyons on the shelf form large 3-way dip and stratigraphic traps on the deep water basin slope in the south western part of the acreage. This play, clearly visible on the newly reprocessed 2D seismic, lies on trend with Total’s recent large Brulpadda and Luiperd discoveries and requires additional 2D or 3D seismic to define drillable prospects.
Post Rift Canyon Play in the Algoa Basin: to the east of the acreage, Cretaceous-age proximal fluvial to distal marine turbidite canyon fill channel sands deposited in an incised valley on the shelf, are mapped on 3D stratigraphically pinching out, updip from the mature source.
Modern 3D seismic led exploration is now required to accurately map and unlock the newly defined leads offshore. The five primary leads alone are estimated capable of containing a combined mean potential of 2.2 billion bbls STOIIP (an upside of over 2.5 Billion STOIIP) and several hundred million barrels of recoverable resources in the three undrilled plays to be refined by new data.
The NewAge operated Group would now like to find a partner(s) interested in earning up to 50% of their combined 100% interest by contributing to past costs and funding a new 3D seismic survey (estimated likely to cost US$ 5 to 7 million gross). The new partner will also have the option to earn additional interest by further contributions to an exploration well in the subsequent Licence Period.
