"Ambitious independent Rhino Resources is within weeks of spudding a third exploration well in Namibia's prolific Orange basin. The privately owned player is moving fast to deepen its understanding of highly prospective Petroleum Exploration Licence 85, where it recently unveiled two oil discoveries at its Sagittarius-1X and Capricornus-1X probes. Capricornus-1X was particularly significant, flowing at 11,000 barrels per day of oil during tests. In the market, there was a widely-held view that Rhino would take its time to further evaluate these discoveries and then drill an appraisal well on one of them, as a precursor to a potential development. However, the Cape Town-based company has instead decided to drill an exploration well on the Volans prospect and if this is a success, then it could jump to the front of the queue as a fast-track development candidate.
Rhino chief executive Travis Smithard told Upstream that the Volans-1X probe will be drilled by Northern Ocean's semi-submersible Deepsea Mira, which recently completed a Namibian campaign for TotalEnergies and is at anchor in Walvis Bay. He said the probe is currently expected to spud between the end of July and early August — with a bit of leeway in both months — and take between 52 and 55 days to drill. Smithard explained the rationale behind this unexpected move and the potential held out by Volans. “Because we've got very good calibration on our seismic between Capricornus and Volans, it really behoves us to investigate what Volans may be.”
The original plan by the partners — which include Azule Energy and Namcor — was to drill Sagittarius and Volans. Smithard described Sagittarius as “an absolute no-brainer” with what “looked like very clear, stacked reservoir systems that were lighting up and giving you amplitude-versus-offset responses; that's effectively what we found — stacked intervals with hydrocarbon.” The decision to test Capricornus and not Volans next was, he said, “an on-the-fly decision supported by the joint venture,” noting that Capricornus is “quite different, slightly older and in a different trend.” Elaborating on Volans, Smithard said: “Its morphology seems a bit more sheet-like, potentially. And if that's the case, then from a development perspective, it may be even easier (to exploit) than something like Capricornus” which itself “looks quite easy” from a morphological perspective. “We want to test Volans because there is potential for that to be our fast-track development option, rather than tying ourselves to the first thing that we find,” said Smithard.
Completed in February 2025, Sagittarius-1X found hydrocarbons, while Capricornus-1X — which wrapped up in April and lies wholly within PEL 85 — tested 11,000 bpd of oil, a volume that was “corrected” to account for the water, nitrogen and other gases flowing from the wellstream. While TotalEnergies and Galp Energia will have to handle substantial amounts of gas in their nearby Venus and Mopane projects, this may not be as much of an issue for Rhino and Azule. “I think we have found a really good quality light oil with a limited associated gas,” said Smithard. “I can't give you the exact number for that gas-oil-ratio because our PVT (pressure, volume and temperature) analysis is still ongoing. “What I can say is that it's our belief that we probably have one of the lower gas-oil-ratios in the region. I don't know if I can say the lowest, but I'd say one of the lowest.”
A long-term monitoring system (LTMS) has been installed in the Capricornus well to assess the reservoir’s performance — particularly its pressure — over time. “Part of the reason we drew down so heavily on that reservoir was to create sufficient pressure differential so that over time we can start to develop a reasonable idea as to where the boundaries of the reservoir are, at least from a pressure communication standpoint,” explained Smithard.
A bonus is that drilling the Volans-1X well some weeks after testing Capricornus-1X would allow the engineering team to go over to the Capricornus well location and receive an additional three months' worth of pressure data. “This gives us a very good handle on what we think our minimum connected volume is at that point in time,” said Smithard, adding that the longer an LTMS is run, then the more accurate the reservoir definition, which helps future drilling. “In our minds, after six-12 months of data gathering, we’ll be in a better position to make decisions on where we place appraisal wells.” If Volans-1X fails, then Rhino will take its time to understand why it did not work and may then look to drill an appraisal well on the Sagittarius complex - or drill some other prospect – or come back to Capricornus. On Sagittarius, the partners are contemplating a purchase of 3D seismic to fill-in a data gap on the eastern extent of the complex. Asked about similarities between Mopane and Sagittarius, Smithard said the Orange basin’s geology “is hugely complex” and argued that commentators should refrain from drawing simplistic parallels just because of the geographical proximity of discoveries. “The reality is that we're finding significant differences between Sagittarius and Capricornus, which are 30 kilometres apart. Drawing simplistic parallels is very dangerous for exploration. I think too many folks have focused on ‘nearology’ where the temptation is to assign value between discoveries and potential prospects based on how far apart they are.”
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