Reuters
LISBON, Dec 3 (Reuters) – Portuguese oil company Galp Energia has agreed to buy a 50 percent stake in Morocco’s shallow-water Tarfaya Offshore bloc from Australia’s Tangiers that makes it the project’s operator.
Galp said on Monday the value of the deal, including Tangiers’ past costs and assuming the costs related to the first exploration well, amounted to $41 million.
The first well is to be drilled by mid-2014 in the Trident prospect of the Tarfaya area. Galp said Trident is estimated to contain 450 million barrels of recoverable reserves, putting the chance of success at 21 percent.
Last week, Galp reached an agreement with Brazil’s HRT Participacoes em Petroleo SA to get a 14 percent stake in three offshore Namibian oil leases.
Galp, which is mostly a refiner, has been growing its oil exploration and production portfolio. It also actively works in Angola and Mozambique, and has various stakes in prolific deep-water Brazilian oil projects, including the giant Lula/Tupi field.
Galp shares were little changed in early trading on Monday at 11.8 euros. (Reporting by Andrei Khalip; Editing by Mark Potter)
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