More billions pumped into oil hunt

TotalEnergies will spend about 30% of its US$1 billion exploration and appraisal budget this year on its hunt for oil offshore Namibia.That equates to nearly N$6 billion at the current exchange rate.Speaking at an investors’ conference call on Wednesday, TotalEnergies chair and CEO Patrick Pouyanné said the French supermajor continues to be optimistic about Namibia. As such, the country will top TotalEnergies’ spending on appraisal and exploration this year.Last year, the oil giant spent half of its exploration budget of US$300 million on Namibia.TotalEnergies and Shell are catalysing Namibia's transition into an oil and gas powerhouse, following significant initial discoveries in the Orange Basin back in 2022.VenusTotalEnergies last year clinched Wood Mackenzie’s Discovery of the Year award for finding the Venus oil prospect offshore Namibia. The prospect is believed to hold up to two billion barrels of oil.Pouyanné on Wednesday said the group had "a very good DST [drill stem test] on one of the Venus wells", while the location of the second was "imperfect"."I repeat that on our side we see a first development clearly in our hands," he told analysts.Asked whether Venus’ potential was bigger than TotalEnergies’ Block 58 offshore Suriname in South America, Pouyanné simply answered: “Wait and see.”After conducting well appraisal drilling last year, TotalEnergies verified a combined resource estimate of nearly 700 million barrels of oil and gas across the two primary fields in Block 58. In September, the group began studies for developing a US$9 billion oil and gas project in Suriname.Other prospectsTotalEnergies will continue to drill in the Orange Basin, looking for “sweet spots”, Pouyanné said."There are a lot of hydrocarbons, there are some sweet spots in terms of productivity [and] permeability. There are some areas which have less good characteristics," he added.Commenting on a possible oil discovery in Mangetti-1A north of Venus, Pouyanné said TotalEnergies found "some hydrocarbons" but added it was "not huge".He added that there was another potential exploration well south of Venus, called Kokerboom.

More billions pumped into oil hunt

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Namibian Sun 2025-12-22

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More billions pumped into oil hunt

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Namibian Sun 2025-12-22

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