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 MAURITANIA
North West Africa
Recent activity in northwest Africa has been
concentrated in Mauritania. Deepwater drilling since 2001 has revealed
several modest-sized oil fields.
During the 1970s and 1980s some intermittent exploration
was carried out but this ceased when Mauritania aligned with Iraq over
the 1991 Gulf War. In the late 1990s Hardman Resources and Woodside of
Australia licensed deepwater acreage and in 2001 Woodside drilled the
Chinguetti-4-1 discovery in 790m of water in PSC Area B 90km west of the
Mauritanian capital, Nouakchott.
 The well intersected a 115m oil column in Tertiary
sandstones. Later that year a second well, Courbine, testing the
Cretaceous, found sub-commercial gas. In July 2002 Chinguetti-4-2, in an
upthrown block on Chinguetti’s northern flank, encountered a 40m oil
column and the production test of this appraisal flowed at a rate of
1,560 Bbls of oil per day but the well was then suspended following
mechanical failure of the testing equipment.
The shallower water (300m) Banda well (Chinguetti-4-3)
also flowed oil. The Chinguetti 4-4 appraisal well was then drilled down
dip of Chinguetti-4-1, which was also successful. Several further
successful wells were drilled in 2003 including Chinguetti 4-5, Tiof
(Chinguetti 4-6) and Tiof West (Chinguetti 4-7). The Chinguetti field
came onstream in 2006 but has had much lower than predicted production rates.
A number of other companies have acquired licences and in
December 2003 Dana Petroleum discovered gas in the Pelican-1 well in
another area in 1700m of water. Woodside’s and other successes will
lead to additional drilling in the region probably ultimately resulting
in a complex of inter-linked developments.
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