ANTANANARIVO - Houston-based Madagascar Oil boosted its estimate of reserves at its Tsimiroro project on the Indian Ocean island by 30 percent on Friday to 1.7 billion barrels.
In March, the company said it produced Madagascar's first oil in 60 years from an onshore steam injection pilot project at Tsimiroro, one of two heavy oil projects the firm is developing.
Indian Ocean acreage is increasingly attractive to explorers keen to feed growing demand from energy-hungry Asian economies.
"The company was able to explore 16 of the 27 new structures identified by an independent evaluation and had a 75 percent exploration success rate," Madagascar Oil's chief executive officer, Alex Archila, said in a statement.
The company said 12 of 17 exploration wells drilled within the Tsimiroro block yielded discoveries, indicating oil in place ranging between 900 million and 1.4 billion barrels.
It said another six appraisal wells confirmed its previous estimate of about 300 million barrels elsewhere in the block.
Tsimiroro's oil gravity was in the range of 14 degrees API, it said, and responded well to being heated by steam injection.
The private firm says its other project at Bemolanga, also in northwest Madagascar, is one of the biggest undeveloped bitumen reserves in the world, with an estimated 9.8 billion barrels of recoverable oil reserves.
In September, French oil giant Total signed an agreement with Madagascar Oil to operate the Bemolanga licence with a 60 percent interest.
In March, the company said it produced Madagascar's first oil in 60 years from an onshore steam injection pilot project at Tsimiroro, one of two heavy oil projects the firm is developing.
Indian Ocean acreage is increasingly attractive to explorers keen to feed growing demand from energy-hungry Asian economies.
"The company was able to explore 16 of the 27 new structures identified by an independent evaluation and had a 75 percent exploration success rate," Madagascar Oil's chief executive officer, Alex Archila, said in a statement.
The company said 12 of 17 exploration wells drilled within the Tsimiroro block yielded discoveries, indicating oil in place ranging between 900 million and 1.4 billion barrels.
It said another six appraisal wells confirmed its previous estimate of about 300 million barrels elsewhere in the block.
Tsimiroro's oil gravity was in the range of 14 degrees API, it said, and responded well to being heated by steam injection.
The private firm says its other project at Bemolanga, also in northwest Madagascar, is one of the biggest undeveloped bitumen reserves in the world, with an estimated 9.8 billion barrels of recoverable oil reserves.
In September, French oil giant Total signed an agreement with Madagascar Oil to operate the Bemolanga licence with a 60 percent interest.
