Higher oil prices have led to an intensification of oil exploration, mainly in the Namibe, Walvis and Orange sedimentary basins (off northern, central and southern Namibia respectively). Smaller oil firms currently predominate, but the minister of mines and energy, Isak Katali, expects majors to return to Namibia if wells due to be drilled in 2011-12 lead to commercial discoveries.

Chariot Oil and Gas, listed on London's Alternative Investment Market (AIM), raised £90m through a share placement in March and intends to drill one well in the final quarter of 2011 and a second in the first quarter of 2012. It holds mainly majority stakes in eight Namibian blocks via its wholly owned subsidiary, Enigma Petroleum-two each in Namibe and Orange, and four in Walvis Bay. Brazil's Petrobras has a 50% farm-out interest in one southern block, 2174A (June 2009, Economic performance), where the Nimrod prospect contains an estimated gross unrisked mean prospective resource of 3.7bn barrels of oil. Chariot recently increased its prospective resource estimate for the two Namibe blocks by 36% to 2.6bn barrels, raising the total for all its Namibian blocks to 13.9bn barrels (10.4bn is attributable to Chariot).

Another AIM-listed firm, Tower Resources, raised £4.3m in an oversubscribed share placement in February and plans to drill its first Namibian well by the end of 2011. Tower's wholly owned subsidiary, Neptune Petroleum (Namibia), has a 15% interest in Licence 0010, covering three Namibe blocks, where Arcadia Petroleum, a British-based global oil trading private firm (85% farmed out in 2007) is operator. The Alpha, Delta and Gamma structures there are estimated to contain recoverable reserves of 10bn barrels.