Kosmos: 'Clear Path to Tortue FID by Year-End'

US independent Kosmos Energy expects final go-ahead on the BP-led Tortue floating LNG project by year-end, it said in 1Q results announced late May 7 and released to the London stock market May 8.

It made a net loss of $50.2mn in this first quarter, almost double its loss of $28.8mn in the same quarter last year. Kosmos finished the quarter with some $1.3bn of liquidity and $1.07bn net debt. 

CEO Andrew Inglis said: "The Tortue gas development, which represents the next phase of major production growth for Kosmos, continues to move forward at pace with all front end engineering design (Feed) contracts now awarded and a clear path to final investment decision around year-end," echoing what BP CFO Brian Gilvary said last week. BP will operate this floating LNG project and has made several provisional Tortue FLNG contract awards in the past two months, all subject to FID. Kosmos will continue to lead any further exploration in the nearby offshore Mauritania and Senegal area. 

Kosmos stated: "With this agreement in place and all FEED contracts now awarded by the operator, Kosmos expects a FID for the Greater Tortue project around end-2018, aiming for first gas in late 2021."

“Strong and growing production from our high-margin assets in Ghana and Equatorial Guinea continues to generate significant free cash flow, underpinning our solid financial position," added Inglis. Operator Tullow last month said that, at the Ghana offshore Jubilee field in which Kosmos is a partner, a further one-week shutdown is required late 2018 to resolve problems over loading cargoes.

Kosmos said it expects higher year on year production from the TEN oil and gas field, offshore Ghana and also Tullow-operated, and also from the Ceiba Field and Okume oil complex offshore Equatorial Guinea, which is Trident Energy-operated but in which both Kosmos and Tullow are partners.