VAALCO Commits to CI-705 Exploration Well Offshore Côte d'Ivoire by End-2028

VAALCO Energy must drill an exploration well on its operated CI-705 block offshore Côte d'Ivoire by the end of 2028, under a government-approved Second Exploration Phase that also requires the company to relinquish 25% of the block's acreage.

The approval, confirmed by the Houston-based independent, follows completion of the block's First Exploration Phase. That first phase consisted of evaluating and interpreting existing seismic and well data — desktop work, in other words, not new acquisition. VAALCO offered no resource figures, no volumetric estimates and no prospect inventory alongside the announcement. What the company did offer is a schedule and a set of commitments.

What does the Second Exploration Phase require?

Three obligations now sit on VAALCO's CI-705 work programme:

• further seismic reprocessing of existing data;
• relinquishment of 25% of the exploration block;
• drilling of an exploration well by end-2028.

The relinquishment clause is standard Ivorian licence practice — operators must drop acreage as phases progress, forcing them to concentrate on what they consider the strongest prospects. It also signals that VAALCO will have to show its hand on which parts of CI-705 it actually believes in.

Where does CI-705 sit, and why did VAALCO buy in?

VAALCO acquired a 70% working interest in CI-705 and took operatorship through a farm-in agreement in March 2025. The block lies in the Ivoirien Basin (the offshore sedimentary basin running along Côte d'Ivoire's Atlantic margin), roughly 70 kilometres west of the company's CI-40 block — home to the producing Baobab and Kossipo oil fields.

That proximity matters. VAALCO already knows the basin's geology from operations at CI-40, and existing infrastructure in the area could shorten any route from discovery to development if a well succeeds.

What is the geological case?

The company said the completed first-phase evaluation identified potential in structural and stratigraphic traps (traps formed either by rock deformation such as folds and faults, or by changes in rock type that seal hydrocarbons in place) within the Upper Cretaceous and Albian sections of the basin.

CEO George Maxwell was direct about the appeal: "We see encouraging prospectivity on the block in the play types proven throughout the Ivoirien Basin including both structural and stratigraphic traps in the Upper Cretaceous and Albian sections."

Maxwell also cited recent discoveries near the block as support for VAALCO's assessment of its exploration potential. He did not name those discoveries, and the company provided no independent resource estimates for CI-705 itself. "Encouraging" is an adjective, not a number — the drilling programme will carry the burden of proof.

How does CI-705 fit VAALCO's wider portfolio?

VAALCO holds production, development and exploration assets across Gabon, Egypt, Côte d'Ivoire and Equatorial Guinea. CI-705 is the exploration leg of that Ivorian footprint, sitting alongside the established CI-40 production hub. The company's stated encouragement about the first-phase results is consistent with its decision to deepen, rather than exit, its Ivorian position — a bet on basin familiarity rather than frontier risk.

The caveat is timing. A 2028 well date leaves a multi-year gap between data evaluation and drilling, during which seismic reprocessing results could reshape or shrink the prospect inventory. Farm-ins at this stage fail more often than they succeed, and nothing in the announcement commits VAALCO beyond a single well.

The watch item is the reprocessing work: its results, likely disclosed over the next 12–24 months, will indicate whether CI-705's Upper Cretaceous and Albian prospects justify the drillbit — or whether the 2028 well becomes a licence-exit obligation rather than a genuine exploration bet.