By Wendell Roelf
CAPE TOWN (Reuters) -Equatorial Guinea will open a new oil and gas licensing round in April to boost exploration and counter dwindling oil output, its minister of hydrocarbons and mining development Antonio Oburu Ondo said on Monday.
“This ronda (licensing round) will be launched in the second quarter of 2026 right after the details of timelines, application procedures and further information will be available,” he told an African energy conference in Cape Town.
Opening in April and running until November, the licensing round offers 24 blocks, two of which are onshore and the rest offshore, said another official.
GROWTH HELD BACK BY DECLINING HYDROCARBONS OUTPUT
The country, a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, currently has six producing fields run by companies including Chevron, Trident Energy, ConocoPhillips and state-owned GEPetrol.
According to OPEC’s 2024 statistical review, Equatorial Guinea produced 241,000 barrels of oil per day at its peak in 2010, but output has since fallen to 55,000 bpd in 2023.
The International Monetary Fund said in an August report on the country’s oil and gas-dependent economy that it expects growth to average a modest 0.9% per year over 2025-30 due to declining hydrocarbon production.
Earlier on Monday, Chevron said its Noble Energy subsidiary had agreed terms with the Central African country on the development of the Aseng gas project, which will help it to reach a final investment decision.
The project, found in Block I of the Douala Basin, will help to sustain supplies of liquefied natural gas to global markets.
It will involve an initial investment of some $690 million and bolster the country’s ambitions to become a regional gas-processing hub, the government said.
As part of those plans, Equatorial Guinea last year agreed with nearby Nigeria to jointly construct the Gulf of Guinea Gas Pipeline.
It is also looking to develop the $4.5 billion EG-27 LNG project with the backing of Afreximbank, which is raising capital for its development.
Afreximbank says the EG-27 project, which focuses on the Ebano field, could produce 2.4 million metric tons of LNG a year over a 20-year period.
(Reporting by Wendell Roelf. Editing by Alexander Winning and Mark Potter)
