Angola looks ahead to a better year
25 January 2012
This year should see growth in oil output, first LNG exports and growing exploration in high-potential pre-salt areas – but new-field developments are still lagging, Martin Quinlan writes
LAST year was not a good one for Angola’s vital oil business. Production was pinned down by engineering problems and the faster-than-expected decline of some of the older fields, while a multi-field start-up was delayed. But 2012 should be better, with output potentially showing growth of as much as 20% by year-end.
According to International Energy Agency (IEA) figures, Angola’s oil production over the first 11 months of last year averaged 1.64 million barrels a day (b/d). Output has declined by more than 5% from the levels of the previous two years – 1.73 million b/d in 2010 and 1.77 million b/d in 2009. The decline leaves the 1.85 million b/d achieved in 2008 as the peak of the country’s rapid expansion phase as a producer (see Figure 1).
As the second-largest supplier to China (which took 788,000 b/d of...