Island secures licence for Moroccan basin

ISLAND Oil & Gas has announced it has been granted a licence in the Zag Basin off the coast of Morocco.

The basin represents an under-explored Palaeozoic North African sedimentary basin for which no seismic data has been acquired to date.

But yesterday the company said it believes an active petroleum system is understood to be present in this basin, based on early drilling history. Island also said there was a proven presence of a source rock, which looks encouraging at this stage because it replicates the kind geophysical structures that underpinned the other major oil and gas fields found in neighbouring countries.