RWE Dea AG, Hamburg, made substantial advances in the implementation of its growth strategy through the successful exploration for gas and oil in 2008: the company has set itself a target to double production by 2013. Efforts are under way to achieve organic growth with new exploration concessions, seismic acquisition and exploration wells all the way through to production.

The starting point en route to this ambitious target is to boost the reserves and resources base: “This year, we have succeeded in developing a substantial volume of proven resources,” emphasized Dr. Georg Schöning, CEO of RWE Dea. He indicated that this growth was based above all on successful exploration work in the core regions of North Africa and Europe.

According to Schöning, it had been possible in the course of 45 exploration and appraisal wells to achieve 26 strikes. “This represents a very high success rate of 58 percent. In particular, our successes in Egypt, Libya and Norway indicate that there is a substantial production potential, which should be brought onstream as speedily as possible”, Schöning added.

“To increase production and maintain it at a high level on a sustained basis, the portfolio needs to be further extended, starting immediately”, explained Thomas Rappuhn, Chief Operations Officer.

In 2008, RWE Dea played an active role by taking stakes in licences in three further countries: the 50 percent share in an exploration concession in Ireland supplements the portfolio of RWE Dea UK. In North Africa, the commitment is being enlarged in a westward direction with activities in Morocco and Mauretania. The two new blocks in Mauretania alone comprise an exploration territory of just under 60,000 square kilometers. As a result, the international exploration area of RWE Dea will increase to approx. 200,000 square kilometers. This territory is significantly larger than half the surface area of the whole of Germany.

In Algeria, RWE Dea opened a representative office in the nation’s capital, Algiers. Rappuhn: “In doing so, we are strengthening our presence in a country that is of great importance to us, and we plan to participate in licence rounds to acquire new stakes.” Offices are also being opened in Baku, the capital of Azerbaidjan, as well as in the Ukrainian metropolis of Kiev. “We are hoping that these measures will result in an improved information flow, from having a permanent representation of our interests in the attractive crude oil and natural gas regions in the Caspian and Black Sea”, Rappuhn explained.

Tags: RWE Dea