A lease agreement has been signed for a mobile offshore drilling unit with Transocean Offshore International Ventures. Two towing and anchor handling vessels to support the rig will be supplied by Varun Shipping Company. The rig and vessels are expected to arrive in Mozambique towards the end of August 2008.

 

"The drilling of explorations wells will take place in deep water, well away from the shallow environmentally sensitive waters of the Bazaruto Archipelago. Safety and protection of the environment will be key to the drilling exploration program that is expected to be completed by year end," says Lean Strauss group general manager, Sasol International Energy Cluster.

 

Sasol Petroleum Sofala Limitada (SPS) and ENH are the concession holders of Blocks 16 and 19 offshore Mozambique. The exploration area covers about 11 000 square kilometres and is directly opposite Sasol's existing onshore gas operations at Pande and Temane.

 

"The drilling campaign is a further demonstration of our commitment to upstream development in Mozambique and the technical and commercial ability of Sasol to execute upstream exploration projects. We recently completed our seismic operation in the two blocks incident free and with no impact on the environment, "says Strauss.

 

Should the drilling campaign be successful, Sasol intends to supply the natural gas to markets in Mozambique and South Africa.