Italian producer Eni is biggest foreign investor in Ghana oil sector in 2017
The oil sector in Ghana received the largest chunk of foreign direct investments in 2017 with Italian oil company, Eni being the biggest foreign investor in the country that year.
Ghana became an oil producer in December 2010 three years after the country announced it had found oil in commercial quantity. By the end of 2011, the country’s GDP grew to about 14 per cent as a result, but it soon dipped to 3.6 per cent by the end of 2016, recording the lowest in 23 years.
Of the total of $9.1 billion foreign direct investments into Ghana in 2017, Eni alone contributed $7.9 billion, which is about 87 per cent of the total investment, according to a report on Ghana’s 2017 foreign direct investments by the fDi Markets magazine, a data service of the Financial Times obtained by ghanabusinessnews.com.
Eni, first announced it had found some oil and gas at its Sankofa-2 well Offshore Cape Three Points in Ghana in April 2011. The company said the Sankofa-2 well was drilled in 864 meters water depth at a distance of about 55 km from the coast and successfully appraised the Sankofa discovery.
Then in July of the same year, it announced another discovery offshore Ghana at the Gye Nyame 1 well. The well is located Offshore Cape Three Point (OCTP) block 50km offshore Ghana.
“The well, which was drilled in 519 meters of water, was drilled to a total depth of 3,349 meters and encountered significant thickness of gas and condensate sands with excellent reservoir characteristics,” said Eni in a statement July 28, 2011.
In 2013, Eni’s largest oil discovery in Ghana was confirmed. It was confirmed that the Sankofa East 2A offshore Ghana is holding about 450 million barrels of oil as Eni announced January 17, 2012.
According to Eni, the drilling was important because it confirmed the “commercial standing of the oil discovery” in the Offshore Cape Three Points (OTCP) block located in the Tano Basin, around 50 km off the coast of Ghana.
Eni estimates an overall potential of the discovery to be around 450 million barrels of oil in place with recoverable resources of up to 150 million barrels.
The Sankofa East 2A well was drilled in 990 meters of water and reached a total depth of 4,050 meters.
The well also encountered 23 meters of gas and condensate gross pay (17 meters net), and 76 meters of gross oil pay (30° API, 32 meters net) in good sands of cretaceous age.
Eni began commercial oil production in the fields in 2017 and gas production in 2018.
By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi
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