Namibia’s upstream oil and gas sector has drawn intense interest recently. The Orange Basin, off the west coast, captured the energy industry’s attention in 2022 when Shell and TotalEnergies announced major light oil and natural gas finds in the Graff and Jonker fields. In 2023, Galp fueled the excitement with its Mopane discovery, driving enthusiasm even higher in this emerging hotspot.
Until now, the Namibian upstream has been focused on exploration, and the country has yet to achieve any commercial production. However, the giant discoveries made since 2022 have changed the game and made Namibia a global exploration hot spot.
Of the three major discoveries, the TotalEnergies Venus find may be the largest, with at least 1 Bbl of recoverable oil resources having been found.
All of these discoveries are yet to be finally appraised, which will be crucial in determining their commercial viability. Issues such as permeability, gas/oil ratio, and reservoir quality need to be addressed. If developed, Venus would also be the deepest offshore development ever.
A recent Namibia country report by AOW said TotalEnergies was expected to start production around 2028. By early 2030, all three projects could be producing, and Namibian oil output could be nearing 1 mil bbl/d. TotalEnergies recently announced it would exit its discoveries offshore South Africa to focus on its Namibia assets.
Before the Orange Basin success, fewer than 20 offshore wells had been drilled across Namibia’s Walvis, Namibe, Lüderitz, and Orange Basins since exploration began in 1974. However, in the past two years, TotalEnergies, Shell, and Galp have made eight discoveries across three blocks in the Orange Basin, representing an estimated 3.5 billion barrels of potentially recoverable oil.
Interest in the deep waters of the Orange Basin has risen exponentially. Galp’s success appears to confirm prospectivity extends north from the acreage held by Shell and TotalEnergies and is encouraging for operators such as Chevron, Woodside, and Rhino Resources. All three have acreage adjoining Galp’s block and plan E+A campaigns in 2024/25.
Aside from appraisal, TotalEnergies will drill at least one more exploration well in its PEL 56 license area. There may also be a bidding war as major players look to farm in to Galp’s Mopane.
ExxonMobil has acreage in the northern Namibe Basin, although this is a different play that will be tested first in the Angolan side of the Namibe basin.
While the offshore Orange Basin has been dominating the headlines, there have been significant developments in onshore frontier basins. In July, Reconnaissance Energy spudded the Naingopo exploration well. The industry will be closely monitoring this well, as it is the first exploration of a previously untapped basin.
The first discovery in Namibian waters was the Kudu gas field—about 130 km off Swakopmund. This field has remained undeveloped since being discovered in ’74, with numerous operators struggling to make it work. BW Energy entered Kudu in 2017 and has made progress, with CEO Carl Arnet saying drilling could start as early as next year.
However, there remain questions, not least whether gas from the deep and ultra-deepwater discoveries will be used in the development. A dispute over access to diamond-rich land around the town of Luderitz is a threat, as is the question of where BW Energy plans to land a pipeline from Kudu.
NAMCOR, Namibia’s national oil company, operates several offshore exploration blocks. According to WoodMacKenzie, Namibia holds an impressive 230,000 square kilometers of licensed acreage, far surpassing Norway’s less than 100,000. Despite this vast territory, Namibia’s potential remains largely untapped, with only 20 deepwater wells drilled— a stark contrast to the thousands in regions like the North Sea and the Gulf of Mexico.
Namibia is addressing this gap. NAMCOR, the national oil company, aims to evolve into a full-scale operator by expanding into downstream operations and sustainable sectors like hydrogen and synthetic fuels. Adopting an investor-friendly strategy, NAMCOR offers competitive fiscal terms that continue to attract investors as the company shifts focus from exploration to production.
