By Staff Reporter
LONDON, Aug. 10 — Eco Atlantic, a London- and Toronto-listed oil and gas exploration company, is seeing interest from oil majors for its exploration blocks offshore Namibia. The company has four blocks in the Walvis Basin, some of which are already covered with 3D seismic.
“We have inbound interest from a few companies,” Eco Atlantic CEO Gil Holzman told S&P Global Commodity Insights. “We have 85% working interest in each of the four blocks, which makes us the second acreage holder in Namibia.”
Namibia is seen as a potential new oil and gas province, with an estimated 11 billion barrels of reserves. In September, TotalEnergies is expected to announce the results of a flow test on its enormous Venus discovery, which could further boost interest in the country.
Holzman said he believes that Eco Atlantic’s blocks have the potential to be “three times Guyana” in terms of reserves. Guyana has seen a number of major oil discoveries in recent years, including the Liza and Payara fields.
Eco Atlantic is also active in other African countries, including South Africa and Angola. The company has a strategy of identifying early-stage exploration opportunities in frontier basins and then farming them out to larger companies once they have de-risked the assets.
Holzman is a strong advocate for African energy security. He believes that African countries should be able to develop their own oil and gas resources to meet their energy needs, rather than being reliant on imports from the West.
“You cannot speak with Africans in Congo or in Namibia about a just energy transition as if you were sitting in the middle of London or New York,” he said. “They should benefit from the abundance of resources that they have.”
Holzman added: “The Western world, which developed itself greatly in the past 100 years using fossil fuel, cannot lecture to Africans now because we burned the entire world and because of global warming, that now you Africans need to go and start cooking using only solar panels.”
Eco Atlantic is well-positioned to benefit from the growing interest in African oil and gas. The company has a strong track record of identifying and de-risking exploration opportunities, and it has a clear strategy for creating shareholder value. If Eco Atlantic is able to make a major discovery in Namibia, it could become a major player in the African oil and gas industry.
