French supermajor TotalEnergies plans to explore for oil and gas resources in an area offshore South Africa where environmentalists have already blocked the exploration rights for another supermajor, Shell.



TotalEnergies plans to drill one well at a location in the Deep Water Orange Basin, off the west coast of South Africa. If results are good, nine more wells could be drilled, SLR Consulting, the company carrying out the environmental assessment, said on its website, as quoted by Bloomberg.

TotalEnergies EP South Africa (TEEPSA) and its partners have applied for Environmental Authorization to undertake exploration activities in Deep Water Orange Basin (DWOB) off the West Coast of South Africa, SLR Consulting said earlier this month.

TotalEnergies made in February a significant discovery of light oil with associated gas on the Venus prospect in the Orange Basin offshore southern Namibia, north to the waters offshore South Africa, where the company plans to explore for more oil.

The initial results are “very promising” in the so-called Orange Basin, Kevin McLachlan, Senior Vice President of Exploration at TotalEnergies, said at the time.

Venus in Namibia could be a “giant oil and gas discovery,” TotalEnergies said in an investor presentation in September. Appraisal and testing are slated for 2023.

But a TotalEnergies exploration and drilling campaign in the Orange Basin offshore South Africa could meet resistance from local communities and environmental groups.

Shell, which also made a large discovery in the Orange Basin offshore Namibia earlier this year, recently saw a setback in its exploration efforts offshore South Africa.

In September, the High Court in Makhanda ruled that Shell’s exploration right to conduct seismic surveys on the Wild Coast of South Africa was granted unlawfully and therefore set it aside.