Johannesburg, 27 July (Argus) — Mozambique is still on course to award upstream blocks in its fourth licensing round in September, a Mozambican oil official said today.

The award of the blocks came as firms including US independent Anadarko, Italian oil firm Eni and South African energy firm Sasol planned offshore drilling this year, said Carlos Zacarias, senior exploration manager at state-owned upstream regulator National Petroleum Institute.

Firms that have bid for blocks in seven areas are South African energy firm Sasol, Australian firm Aguia Energy, US-based CH-SwissOil, Norway's DNO International, UK-based NewAge and Canada's Touchstone Oil & Gas.

Sasol already operates the Pande and Temane gas fields in Mozambique, where the gas is piped to Sasol's chemical and synthetic fuel plants in South Africa.

Mozambique is also studying the potential of building a LNG or gas-to-liquids facility utilising the country's gas potential, Zacarias told the Africa Gas and LNG conference in Johannesburg.

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