South Africa Oil and Gas Drilling

Maritime Drilling School

South Africa could be the next big thing in

offshore oil and gas drilling. Durban President

Jacob Zuma mentioned on Wednesday that

research shows a high number of oil reserves

off the coast of South Africa, potentially 9

billion barrels of oil and 11 billion barrels of

natural gas, these numbers provided by IOL.

It’s a number of barrels that could supply

South Africa for many years in the future, 40

years matching with current South African oil

consumption and 375 years of the country’s

current level of gas consumption.

It was also on Wednesday that President

Zuma announced, because of their findings,

his plan to drill in these deep-water reserves

for the next 10 years. 30 rigs will be deployed

to exploit the rich resources located off the

coast.

The reserves could bring production coming

from the South African coast to 80 percent of

its current oil and gas imports, up to 370,000

barrels of fossil fuels per day for the

foreseeable future with a max prediction of 20

years of production.

With the amount of production that is

scheduled to happen in the next 10 years,

there will be many new jobs coming to the

country as well, boosting its economy at a

very important time. Predictions are coming in

and it is expected that there will be 130,000

new jobs coming to the country, boosting its

GDP growth by 1 percent each year the

drilling takes place.

The oil and gas exploration has not been the

only thing taking place in the vast sea of the

coast. President Zuma stated that the reason

all of this new found information is coming to

them now is due to the fact the ocean in the

area has remained untapped and mostly

unexplored.

Discovered resources should lead to

aquaculture, an extension of South Africa’s

economic area and more room for ship

repairs.

For more information go to:www.maritimedrillingschool.org