The South Atlantic’s next exploration chapter

The South Atlantic is the defining frontier of conventional deepwater exploration, and two of its anchors look nothing alike: one approaching 50 years of drilling, the other barely tested. Yet on the Upper Cretaceous play they share, the frontier Southwest African Coastal Basin is analogous to what a re-imaged ultra-deepwater campaign in Brazil’s mature Santos Basin could deliver. 

In a new long-form report, Wood Mackenzie’s expert analysts used the Conventional Plays dataset in our Lens Subsurface modelling tool to move from high-level benchmarking of the region’s five key basins to play-level comparison of the two analogues. We have created a concise insight from the full report for upstream exploration, subsurface and new ventures professionals looking to identify the next South Atlantic opportunity. 

In this report: 

• Benchmarking the South Atlantic play: a clear hierarchy across five basins 

• Where five-basin exploration capex is currently focused 

• Why discovered ultra-deepwater reserves in the Santos Basin understate its true potential  

• Where the economics of the two margins diverge, and why  

• Where the next South Atlantic opportunity lies 

The South Atlantic oil and gas play’s five key basins: shared geology but different maturities 

While separated geographically, the five most prolific offshore basins in the South Atlantic share the same geology. Campos, Santos, Guyana, Côte d'Ivoire and SW African Coastal basins were all formed when the African and South American tectonic plates ripped apart in the Early Cretaceous period.  

Over 1,400 exploration wells have been drilled across the five basins, with a quarter making a discovery, 57% of those discoveries in Upper Cretaceous Sandstone plays. But the five basins sit at very different stages of maturity. Santos and Campos are mature and Guyana is mid-cycle with strong momentum. Côte d'Ivoire has yet to deliver a step-change, while the Southwest African Coastal Basin has barely been tested against its mapped prospective area.   

Now fill out the form at the top of the page to download your free copy of the report.