Trump, fresh from a state visit to the UK, warned that excessive taxation and regulatory hurdles have all but shut down new North Sea development. “There’s tremendous oil that hasn’t been found in the North Sea,” he said. “They essentially closed it by making it so highly taxed that no developer, no oil company, can go there.”
TotalEnergies SE has signed production sharing contracts (PSCs) for four adjoining exploration blocks spanning about 12,700 square kilometers (4,903.49 square miles) in Liberian waters.
The company increased its ownership in WestOil Limited to 48.5%, giving it a 33.95% indirect working interest in Block 2712A, a 5,484 km² license in the basin’s core. The block sits adjacent to acreage held by Chevron and Pan Continental, strategically positioning Oregen within a high-potential exploration corridor.
“This award of a promising Exploration permit, with the material Nzombo prospect, reflects our continued strategy of expanding our Exploration portfolio with high impact prospects, which can be developed leveraging our existing facilities, and confirms our longstanding partnership with the Republic of the Congo,” senior vice-president exploration Kevin McLachlan said.
Signed by state-owned Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS), the deals call for the drilling of 10 wells in onshore and offshore areas as part of efforts to ramp up upstream activity. Egypt has been facing output declines due to field depletion and delays in production investment plans.
After years of public vows to wean themselves off fossil fuels, the world’s biggest oil companies are dusting off their drilling maps and doubling down on exploration.
In February 2025, Trinidad and Tobago launched a bid round for 26 deepwater exploration blocks that included Block 24 and Block 26, along with 24 blocks in the Trinidad and Tobago Deep Atlantic Area, but does not include the blocks that ExxonMobil is interested in. Reuters reports that the company first approached the Trinidadian authorities to obtain the blocks in November 2024.
Earlier this year, the Trinidad and Tobago government announced plans to tender 26 offshore blocks along its eastern and northern coast. The deadline for submissions was July 2, and the winning bids will be announced in three months. The blocks subject to that tender, however, do not include the seven blocks that Exxon is in talks about, Reuters noted in its report.
Chevron Corp. and TotalEnergies SE are competing in Libya’s first energy exploration tender since the 2011 conflict, the country’s state-run oil firm said, as the OPEC member looks to oil majors to help ramp up production to a record.
The Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) has awarded six offshore and onshore exploration blocks in a bid to attract new investments and ramp up hydrocarbons production, Egypt’s Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources announced on Wednesday.