There were favorable expectations in the first decade of the 2000s for West African petroleum: the owner of Vanco Energy, Gene Van Dyk, said in 2003: “In terms of reserves, I think that West Africa could reach 100 billion barrels, which is equivalent to Iran or Kuwait”…
The euphoria in the United States about West African oil went up in smoke when the shale revolution came… but China keeps on the road of obtaining secure sources of oil supply for its economic growth.
Total and its partners, which include Nigerian National Petroleum Corp, South Atlantic Petroleum Ltd, CNOOC E&P Nigeria Ltd, and Petrobras Oil & Gas BV, have started production from Egina oil field…
Oil drillers, flush with cash after crude’s recovery, are turning their attention back to the continent’s potentially vast resources…
A total of 64 planned and announced crude and natural gas projects are expected to commence operations in sub-Saharan Africa between 2018 and 2025.
Africa’s government may award its first shale gas exploration licenses by the end of September, after environmental objections delayed the process.
China’s Sinopec has agreed to pay almost $1 billion for a 75 percent stake in Chevron’s South African assets and its subsidiary in Botswana, securing its first major refinery on the continent. The assets include a 100,000 barrel-per-day oil refinery in Cape Town, a lubricants plant in Durban as well as 820 petrol stations and other oil storage facilities. They also include 220 convenience stores across South Africa and Botswana. With a growing middle class, demand in South Africa for refined petroleum has increased by nearly 5 percent annually over the past five years.
OEF REVIEW:South Africa will give the green light in the next 12 months to companies looking to explore for shale gas under the semi-arid Karoo basin. Royal Dutch Shell, Falcon Oil & Gas and Bundu Gas & Oil are among five companies which have applied for exploration licenses being reviewed by South Africa’s Petroleum Agency.
OEF REVIEW: China’s president Xi Jinping has made major pledges in foreign aid, and Africa will foreseeably benefit greatly from the new packages. Even though developing countries and the development community have welcomed the aid pledges there has been harsh criticism of them from within Chinese society.
Algeria Algeria’s hydrocarbons basins hold two significant shale gas and shale oil formations: the Silurian Tannezuft Shale and the Devonian Frasnian Shale. The Energy Information Administration, Advanced Resources International, Inc (EIA-ARI) report World Shale Gas and Shale Oil Resource Assessment, June 2013, which analyses the Ghadames (Berkine) and Illizi Basins in eastern Algeria, the Timimoun,…
