Block 1 CBK - South Africa5 May 2026 18:08
Https://www.upstreamonline.com/exploration/namcor-hunts-partner-to-drill-2-billion-barrel-prospects-in-orange-basin-block/2-1-1983956
"Namibia's state oil company has identified a pair of multibillion-barrel drilling targets in a shallow-water Orange basin block, not far east of the long-dormant Kudu gas condensate discovery. Namcor operates Petroleum Exploration Licence (PEL) 79 in partnership with local player Giraffe Energy and is on the look-out for a new investor to help explore the asset’s potential. Comprising blocks 2815 and 2915, the partners are in the middle of a one-year extension period of the PEL’s second renewal period. While most of the seismic shot in PEL 79 is 2D, Frieda Thomas, Namcor’s senior exploration geoscientist, last month said that studies of 3D data acquired in the west have mapped “lots of leads and prospects”.
Prospectivity has been identified in Lower Cretaceous and Upper Cretaceous. The two main prospects are Meerkat and Sitatunga that between them, according to preliminary estimates, could house total prospective resources of about 4.5 billion barrels of oil. Thomas told delegates at the Namibia International Energy Conference in Windhoek that, fortuitously, these prospects could be targeted by a single exploration well.
“Should you drill a well, you are able to test both of them at the same time.” Both prospects are stratigraphic traps, with the Albian-age Meerkat the larger of the two — it could contain 2.4 billion barrels of oil. Sitatunga, Turonian in age, possibly holds 2.1 billion barrels. “What is really interesting about this block,” remarked Thomas, “is the stacked nature of the reservoirs that we have”.
She said Meerkat and Sitatunga each is composed of five stacked reservoirs, while between them, leads have been identified that are also interpreted to hold stacked zones of interest. Meerkat is interpreted to potentially hold 600 metres of gross reservoir, with the estimate for Sitatunga standing at 400 metres. The source rocks in the block are reckoned to be marine Aptian and lacustrine syn-rift, for both prospects. “It's really prospective, and we are still working hard to unlock the (promise) of this block,” added Thomas. She also noted that for PEL 79, the licence is believed to sit on the same syn-rift trend identified in South African waters by the legacy AJ-1 probe, which found non-commercial oil volumes. Eco Atlantic drilled the Gazania-1 probe in South Africa in 2022, targeting a prospect in this play, but it also was unsuccessful.
Even so, Thomas said: “We still believe in the prospectivity of the syn-rift within our block.” Namcor holds an approximate 67% stake in the 13,829-square kilometre licence, with Giraffe on about 33%.Sintana Energy has an indirect interest of 16.17% in the block through an earlier deal linked to Giraffe. Only one exploration well has been drilled on the acreage, 2815-1, which Thomas said showed evidence of hydrocarbons. Water depths in the block range u
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