TotalEnergies has started drilling a well in the "Golden" block off Namibia, which, if successful, could double the estimated resources of the "Venus" discovery to around six billion barrels of oil.

TotalEnergies estimates that the discovery could contain more than three billion barrels of oil, and that the exploration well it is now drilling - a potential western extension of the discovery - could double this resource estimate, reports Up Stream Online.

The French giant drilled the Venus-1X discovery well in February 2022 and this year is spending half of its exploration budget on an exploration, appraisal and well-testing campaign with two rigs to determine the size of the discovery.

O bnnbloomberg recalls that in 2022, the oil company's CEO, Patrick Pouyanné, recognized the capacity of the discovery in Namibia, with the potential to be a global "giant". At the time, the CEO was presenting the project to investors in New York.

The French company announced a first discovery in Namibia in February, weeks after Shell had also successfully drilled an offshore well in the country.

In the months following the first discoveries in Namibia, TotalEnergies and Shell executives sought to hush up speculation that they had found significant resources.

The consulting firm Wood Mackenzie Ltd. bnnbloomberg, estimates that the discoveries in Namibia could contain around 6.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent of recoverable reserves.

Namibia has high hopes for its embryonic oil industry, predicting that it could double its GDP by 2040.