While Shell PLC (LSE:SHEL, NYSE:SHEL) was making waves Thursday with a dog’s dinner of a trading update, a little news was starting to permeate about some success with the drill bit.
It has reportedly identified the oil equivalent of the motherlode off the shores of Namibia.
According to the respected industry publication Upstream, citing sources, Shell's Graff-1 well in a new frontier called the Orange Basin, has discovered 2bn barrels of oil and gas.
It follows the success, though not of this scale, in a neighbouring block by the French group Total.
READ: The Orange Basin: A one minute guide
Next off the block, but across the sea border in the South African portion of the Basin, is Eco (Atlantic) Oil & Gas Ltd, which on Wednesday raised US$25.5mln to fund its portion of the well costs of Gazania-1, which is targeting an estimated 350mln of barrels of oil equivalent.
According to the oil and gas research team at City broker Peel Hunt, Gazania, while south of the other two is in the same geological basin. In fact, historic drilling in Eco’s area discovered light crude.