TotalEnergies is reportedly days away from conducting the first production test on its Venus oil discovery offshore Namibia.
The development, according to Upstream, comes amid hints that the thickness of hydrocarbon pay zones may be bigger than originally revealed, with the Deepsea Mira semi-submersible rig set to conduct a flow test.
This comes as the French energy giant has allocated almost 50% of its global exploration budget of N$5.5 billion (US$300 million) to Namibia this year, aiming to confirm the multibillion-barrel discovery in Block 2913B (PEL 56) located in the Orange Basin.
The Venus discovery is a light oil and associated gas field, located approximately 290 kilometers off the coast of Namibia, in a water depth of approximately 3,000 meters.
Block 2913B covers approximately 8,215 km² offshore Namibia, and TotalEnergies is the operator with a 40% working interest, alongside QatarEnergy with 30%, Africa Oil’s Impact Oil and Gas with 20%, and the National Petroleum Corporation of Namibia (Namcor) with 10%.
The ultra-deepwater Venus-1X exploration well, which was drilled to a total depth of 6,296 meters, was spudded at the beginning of December 2021, using the Maersk Voyager drillship.
Global research and consultancy group, Wood Mackenzie, has suggested that first oil could flow from Venus by 2028, through more than 35 production wells tied back to a leased floating production system (FPSO).
According to government estimates, the Shell and TotalEnergies discoveries have the potential to generate annual taxes and royalties ranging from N$60 billion to N$95 billion, with the ability to create 3,600 jobs at the peak of production.
