Harare (New Ziana) – In a historic development, described as an “exciting and long-anticipated moment,” for Zimbabwe, Australian firm, Invictus, started drilling its first exploratory well on Friday last week in Muzarabani, where it is searching for oil and gas.

The well, dubbed the Mukuyu 1, will be sunk to a depth of 3.5 kilometres in a drilling exercise set to run for eight weeks.

In an update, the company said the Mukuyu well is one of the largest oil and gas exploration prospects to be drilled globally in 2022.

The well is targeting a combined prospective resource potential of 20 trillion cubic feet and 845 million barrels of conventional gas condensate or about 4.3 billion barrels of oil equivalent.

“The Company will provide regular updates as the two-well drilling campaign progresses,” the company said.

Invictus managing director Scott Macmillan said: “This is an exciting and long-anticipated moment for Invictus and our shareholders. Invictus, together with our partners, have methodically de-risked and matured the Mukuyu prospect and our Cabora Bassa acreage over the last several years and the commencement of our drilling campaign is a significant milestone.”

“Mukuyu-1 is a world-class, basin opening well which, if successful, could be transformative for the Company and Zimbabwe,” he said.

Soon after drilling Mukuyu 1, a second well, the Baobab, will be sunk down to 1.5 km, with both exercises set to give a better idea of the existence and full extent of the oil and gas reserves in the Muzarabani prospect following the collection of more than 800 km of seismic data in 2021.

Initial exploration work has been promising, and points to a significant resource, setting Zimbabwe on course to becoming an oil and gas producing nation.

In 2020, the Zimbabwe government classified the Muzarabani project as one of the priority development projects which can provide a significant economic benefit to the economy in pursuit of an upper middle-income economy by 2030.
New Ziana