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Ghana’s Ministry of Energy has extended by 12 months, Tap Oil’s exploration period to continue drilling at the Offshore Accra Contract Area.
The Australian firm who confirmed the extension in a statement said May 11, 2012, “The Initial Exploration Period now ends on 23 September 2013, by which date the commitment well must be drilled.”
Tap Oil said in 2011, it acquired a new 3D seismic over the deepwater part of the Contract Area and “interpretation of the data at hand indicates multiple large prospects within both the post-rift Upper Cretaceous fan sands (the same play type as Jubilee) and pre-rift Lower Cretaceous rotated fault blocks (the same play type as the Espoir and Baobab oil fields)”.
To date, the company indicated that several prospects and leads have been mapped and have unrisked prospective resources of greater than three billion barrels.
Well planning is in progress with various rig options currently being investigated, Tap said.
Located at the south-east of Accra, the offshore covers an area of 2000 square kilometres, in water depths ranging from less than 50 metres to greater than 2500 metres.
Partners at the Accra Contract Area are Tap Oil, Afex Oil, Challenger Minerals and the Ghana National Petroleum Company.
The Petroleum Agreement between Tap, its Joint Venture partners, the Republic of Ghana and the GNPC governing exploration of the Contract Area was formally ratified on March 24, 2010.
http://www.ghanabusinessnews.com/2012/05/13/ghana-extends-tap-oil-exploration-contract-offshore-accra-by-12-months/
