Ghana Announces Hydrocarbon Find in Offshore Carbonate Well

Ghana has announced a hydrocarbon discovery at the Nya Gyidie1X exploration well, the country’s first successful test of a carbonate reservoir as a primary exploration target, President John Dramani Mahama said on November 10. The well is in the Deepwater Cape Three Points block, about 148 kilometres offshore.

The announcement marks a new geological target for Ghana, where previous commercial discoveries have been in sandstone reservoirs. Mahama described the result as the first successful test of a Cenomanian-Turonian carbonate play, a type of rock formation being explored for its potential to hold oil or gas.

Planet One Oil Gas, which operates the block with GOIL Upstream Limited and the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation, said hydrocarbons were found at the well. The type and volume have not been established across the reported accounts, and no reserve estimate or flow rate has been published. One account described the discovery as gas and condensate, but that specific composition was not confirmed in the other reporting.

Planet One chief executive Andaleeb Sehgal said evaluation was under way to determine the discovery’s scale and an appropriate development approach. Its...