African Petroleum has succeeded in gaining extensions to two offshore licenses from the government of Cote d’Ívoire, which allow more time to interpret recently acquired seismic data and to drill wells.

With amendments to the PSC license periods covering blocks CI-509 and CI-513, Africa Petroleum says it will have more time to interpret 3-D data recently acquired over the two areas, while the amendments also allow one extension to the license terms for the first exploration period over each block at the expense of subsequent exploration periods.

Effectively the government-approved amendments provide the company with more time to drill a first commitment well – in the case of block CI 509 up to March 2016, and up until December 2015 for CI-513.

Approval for the amendments has been given by both the Ministry of Petroleum and the Ministry of Finance in Cote d’Ivoire, and by the national oil company, Petroci.

Offshore