US-based oil and gas producer Anadarko Petroleum has said that a run of exploration successes offshore Mozambique could justify expanding a proposed LNG development from two to eight trains
Anadarko vice-president for exploration Frank Patterson told delegates at the Africa Oil Week conference in Cape Town that the Golfinho discovery now holds as much as the earlier Prosperidade discovery, taking total recoverable reserves of gas in the Rovuma Basin block to more than 60 tcf.
The initial plan of two five million mt/year plants, from were production has been scheduled to start in 2018, could now be expanded to eight as more discoveries are developed, leading Patterson to argue that much larger scale exports could now be possible.
"The two train development is just the beginning. We think there could be as many as eight," Patterson remarked.
Anadarko's discovery is sited close to Eni's large reserve discovery, which has been estimated to hold at least 70 tcf, of which more than 70 per cent is located within the same geological structure as Anadarko's sites.
Eni exploration head Roberto Casula has already hinted that a unitisation deal could be a "key trigger" for the development plan and added that the company expected to finalise a deal with Anadarko in the next few months.
