General Thoughts, page-1912

One more. Hopefully another Jonker.

Shell targets one more shot at glory with ‘lucky charm’ rig in Namibia’s white-hot Orange basin

"Shell aims to drill at least one more exploration well on its prolific Orange basin acreage offshore Namibia — where it has so far discovered some 5.4 billion barrels of oil — before its rig contract expires in mid-2024.

Earlier this week, the supermajor turned down an opportunity to extend its charter of Northern Ocean’s semi-submersible rig Deepsea Bollsta beyond June 2024 when its contact will now expire. The rig — whose operation is managed by Odfjell drilling — has been something of a lucky charm for Shell, making four major discoveries out of five probes drilled to date, and drilling two appraisal wells, with another ongoing.

When the Deepsea Bollsta is released next year, Shell will focus on improving its understanding of the billions or barrels of oil resources, as well as substantial gas volumes, that it has discovered to date in Petroleum Exploration Licence 39 — also known as Block 2913A — to plan future operations and pull together the foundations of a development plan. However, before then, the supermajor will keep drilling and could potentially turn up another discovery of the next exploration campaign in Block 2913A is a success.

According to Namibia’s state oil company, Namcor, Jonker holds about 2.5 billion barrels of oil in place and is likely to be developed before Graff — which holds some 2.7 billion barrels of in-place resource, because it is considered to be the block’s sweet spot and should be easier to produce."