For most of the last decade, Namibia’s offshore story has been defined by the Orange Basin — Venus, Graff, Mopane, billion-barrel headlines and supermajor commitments.
Yet long before the deepwater south turned global, there was Walvis Basin.
It was the country’s first real offshore test case, the place where Namibia learned that hydrocarbons existed beneath its continental margin, and the basin that has repeatedly refused to disappear even without a commercial discovery to its name.
The first modern exploration cycle began in the 1990s, when Norsk Hydro, Saga Petroleum and Statoil secured Exploration Licence 001.
They acquired more than 8,000 kilometres of seismic data before drilling the first Namibian offshore wells in 1994 and 1995.
Those wells encountered reservoir, carbonate build-ups and hydrocarbon shows.
They did not encounter a field. Industry moved on, driven not by geological disappointment but by the cost of deepwater drilling and the gravitational pull of Angola at the time.
Walvis Basin remained dormant until 2013, when HRT returned with the most aggressive drilling programme the basin had ever seen.
Wingat-1 became the first well in Namibian history to recover light oil to the surface.
Murombe-1 followed, intersecting reservoir-quality sands that were water-wet. Source maturity, charge and migration were proven, but trapping remained unresolved.
The HRT campaign was initially led by Márcio Rocha Mello, later by Milton Romeu Franke, and was supported locally by Knowledge Katti and Elias Shikongo. HRT ultimately exited due to funding pressures rather than geology, relinquishing acreage in 2014–2015.
The data footprint they left behind — seismic, cores, logs — later became the foundation of PEL 82.
Tower Resources and Repsol carried the next torch when they drilled Welwitschia-1 in PEL 0010, later renamed PEL 94.
Tower was steered publicly by Jeremy Asher and Graeme Thomson, while Repsol’s exploration oversight sat under Luis Cabra.
Welwitschia-1 was re-spudded as Welwitschia-1A in 2014, drilled to a total depth of 2,454 metres, encountered weaker sands than predicted, and never reached the deeper Aptian-Albian targets.
No hydrocarbons were found, and the block was relinquished.
In 2018, Tullow Oil drilled Cormorant-1 in PEL 37 alongside ONGC Videsh, Pancontinental Oil & Gas and Paragon Oil & Gas.
The Ocean Rig Poseidon drilled to 3,855 metres, intersecting a sandstone reservoir with wet-gas indications but no trapped hydrocarbons.
Angus McCoss, Tullow’s Exploration Director, later noted that source and charge were never in doubt — only the structural placement of the well. Tullow withdrew, and Walvis again went quiet.
Yet the basin did not collapse. It was kept alive through stewardship rather than drilling.
Custos Energy and Namcor held PEL 82 for several years, maintaining the seismic record, well data and basin integrity.
The block retained more than 3,500 kilometres of 2D seismic and approximately 9,500 square kilometres of 3D seismic coverage, including legacy datasets from the Wingat-1 and Murombe-1 wells.
Custos, led by Knowledge Katti, repeatedly argued that Walvis was not a geological failure but an untested commercial opportunity.
NAMCOR preserved the licence instead of allowing it to lapse.
The basin awaited an operator capable of funding a deepwater wildcat exceeding $100 million.
That operator arrived in early 2025, when Chevron farmed into PEL 82, securing 80% and operatorship, while Custos Energy and Namcor retained 10% each, with Sintana Energy holding indirect carried exposure via Custos.
The value of the farm-in has never been disclosed publicly. Still, the asset Chevron acquired was substantial, comprising seismic coverage across nearly 10,000 square kilometres and two thoroughly analysed historical wells with proven oil charge.
Drilling is expected in 2026 — the first actual basin-defining test since HRT.
At much the same time, Stamper Oil & Gas entered the Walvis Basin not through a bidding round but by acquiring BISP Exploration in 2025.
That transaction granted Stamper carried interests in PEL 98 and PEL 106.
The terms of the acquisition were transparent and structured: an eight hundred thousand US dollar deposit paid into escrow, an additional five million US dollars due at closing, five million Stamper shares at transaction close, and a further one million two hundred and fifty thousand US dollars plus eight million five hundred and sixty-one thousand six hundred and forty-four shares to be issued after twelve months.
It is one of the clearest cost-of-entry benchmarks into offshore Namibia on record.
PEL 98 lies inboard of Chevron’s PEL 82, with approximately seven hundred and seventy kilometres of two-dimensional seismic acquired historically and one legacy exploration well.
Eco Atlantic previously held 85% before executing a farm-out to Lamda Energy in 2025, retaining a minority working interest.
PEL 106 sits northwest of PEL 82, backed by more than two thousand square kilometres of three-dimensional seismic and roughly two thousand three hundred kilometres of older two-dimensional coverage.
An Environmental Impact Assessment for further three-dimensional acquisition was approved in July 2025. Oranto Petroleum holds the block with Stamper participating via carried exposure across mapped turbidite and stratigraphic prospects.
The Walvis corridor today is held by multiple licence owners. Chevron, Custos Energy, Namcor, Sintana Energy controllano il PEL 82.
Eco Atlantic Oil & Gas holds PEL 97, PEL 99 and PEL 100. Lamda Energy and Eco Atlantic share PEL 98. Oranto Petroleum and Stamper Oil & Gas hold PEL 106. Geo Exploration holds PEL 94.
Black Eagle E&P holds PEL 88. Babecca Business Links holds PEL 92. Mel Oil and Gas Exploration holds PEL 93. Elephant Oil holds PEL 101.
Apprentice Investment holds PEL 103. Eight Offshore Investments holds PEL 104.
Some of these groups are active, others silent, but all remain embedded in the basin’s forward structure.
Walvis Basin has already produced oil, but not yet a field. Its petroleum system is proven, its reservoir presence is documented, and its seismic footprint is among the most mature on the West African margin.
What the basin has lacked is a successful trapped accumulation drilled by capital that can absorb failure and return. For the first time in more than a decade, such an attempt is coming.
If Chevron drills in 2026 and oil flows again, the basin will move from speculation to development. If it does not, Walvis will still advance, because knowledge and data grow with every well.
Either way, Stamper Oil & Gas will not be arriving late. It is already inside the gate.
