Sinopec buys stake in Nigeria oilfield

China Petrochemical Corp, known as Sinopec group, Asia's largest petroleum and petrochemical company, has reached an agreement to purchase a Nigerian oil field with France's Total ADR, one of the four largest petroleum and petrochemical companies in the world, Sinopec announced on Monday.

The Chinese company is expected to buy 20 percent of the equity in OML 138 block that belongs to Total, with an agreement price of $2.46 billion. The deal still needs to be approved by related governments.

OML 138 block is located in West Africa's Niger delta basin. It covers an area of 906 square kilometers, with water depth of 500 meters to 1,000 meters. Total has 20 percent of the total equity and is the operator of the oil field, whose estimated recoverable reserve is about 100 million barrels.

The main oilfield was put into production in late February this year, with an equity yield of 24,000 barrels a day and 1.3 million tons each year.

Through this transaction, Sinopec not only can get considerable assets but also can accumulate experience and improve its ability in deepwater oil exploration, a manager from the company said.

mengfanbin@chinadaily.com.cn