Sierra Leone wants to be the next frontier for oil and gas exploration in West Africa
Sierra Leone may start its next round of oil and gas licensing later this year, but first it will wait for the results of a recently conducted offshore 3D seismic survey, its first in more than ten years, a senior government official said Thursday.
In an effort to de-risk development in Sierra Leone’s offshore basin, consulting firm GeoPartners began a six-week seismic survey last month in collaboration with the government’s petroleum directorate.
According to Foday Mansaray, director general of the Sierra Leone Petroleum Directorate, “the reprocessing of that data is happening now with our multi-client partners, TGS, and we are hoping to get something to push to the market in October” regarding a possible licensing launch date.
According to him, the West African nation, where both Russia’s Lukoil and Anadarko Petroleum have previously found oil but not in commercial amounts, would offer up to 60 offshore blocks in its sixth round of oil and gas auctions. 2023 saw the end of the previous round.
He did note that ultra-deep areas that are typically eligible for direct talks are unlikely to be included in the new blocks.
An estimated 30 billion barrels of oil equivalent can be recovered offshore from Sierra Leone, including the massive Vega potential that Anadarko previously discovered, which holds about 3 billion barrels of recoverable oil, according to Mansaray.
Sierra Leone is eager to establish itself as a new exploratory frontier. It is located between regional oil-producing nations, such as Senegal to the north and Ivory Coast to the south, and along the Atlantic coast.
Mansaray stated that throughout the last 18 months, part of its licensed data has been acquired by Shell (SHEL.L), Petrobras (PETR4.SA), Hess (HES.N), and Murphy Oil (MUR.N).
He suggested Sierra Leone might be on the cusp of a breakthrough, citing Namibia and Guyana as nations where exploration has exploded after years of stagnation.
“I firmly believe that Sierra Leone is on the cusp of something big and we are going to be one of the next big and successful stories.”
