Lukoil may quit most projects as no large discoveries made

Russia’s Lukoil oil company may leave almost all of its projects in West Africa as it has made no large discoveries there, Leonid Fedun, the company’s vice president said.

“Many of these projects need more studies, but I am rather pessimistic. No decisions have been made, but we have not made any big commercial discoveries,” he said.

It will be recalled that between 2011 and 2012, Lukoil’s focused on the attempt to carry out exploration and subsequently, the appraisal of its 3 offshore blocks in Cote d’Ivoire, 1 block in Ghana and another block in Sierra Leone in addition to some additional acquisitions of upstream projects in the waters of other West African states.

Lukoil took over the operatorship of offshore exploration projects CI-101 and CI-401 (Republic of Cote d’Ivoire) and Cape Three Points Deep Water (CTPDW, Republic of Ghana) from Vanco Group. All of the three blocks are located close to each other on the deepwater continental slope in the Gulf of Guinea.

Lukoil entered these projects in 2006 with a share of 56.66 percent.  Since then 3 deepwater exploration wells were drilled (Dzata and Cheetah prospects) within CTPDW block which discovered a field with hydrocarbon reserves of non-commercial categories.

In 2011, an oil and gas condensate field was discovered in a sandstone pay in a well drilled to the depth of 4,100 meters in water depth of 1,700 meters on CI-401 block (Independance prospect).

Lukoil, Russia’s second-largest oil producer, has the biggest foreign exposure among Russian energy companies. It was once betting on West Africa as a potential source of its future production growth. Lukoil’s biggest foreign project is West Qurna-2 in Iraq.