14 October 2008
The Malaysian state oil company, Petronas, has become the fifth foreign company to sign a contract with the Mozambican government, giving it a licence to explore for oil in the Rovuma basin, in the northern Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado.
An Exploration and Production Concession Contract was signed in the Cabo Delgado provincial capital, Pemba, on Friday, by Datuk Abdullah Karim, vice-President of the Petrronas subsidiary, Petronas Carigali Mozambique, and by the chairperson of the Mozambican government's National Petroleum Institute (INP), Arsenio Mabote.
Under the agreement, Petronas will hold a 90 per cent stake in Rovuma Basin Blocks 3 and 6, which are both offshore. The other 10 per cent goes to Mozambique's publicly owned National Hydrocarbon Company (ENH)
According to a Petronas press release, during the first phase of the exploration period, Petronas "will reprocess 150 line-kilometres of 2D seismic data and acquire 7,000 line-kilometres of 2D seismic data and 120 samples of geo-chem cores".
In the first three years, Petronas has pledged to spend 5.6 million US dollars on the geological and geophysical evaluation of the two blocks.
There are known to be hydrocarbons in the Rovuma basin, because have some have seeped to the surface in parts of Cabo Delgado. But nobody is yet certain whether oil exists in commercially viable quantities, although experts say that the geology points in that direction. The discovery of significant reserves of natural gas on the Tanzanian side of the basin is taken as a hopeful sign.
The other companies with licences to explore Rovuma basin blocks are Anadarko (of the United States), Artumas (Canada), ENI (Italy) and Norsk Hydro (Norway).
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