Top Court Ends Shell's South African Wild Coast Offshore Lease

The South African lease area covered part of the Orange Basin, a geological region where Shell has had success on the Namibian side of the boundary line, above (Press handout courtesy Odfjell)

Last Friday, oil major Shell lost a long-running court battle over its offshore oil and gas exploration plans for a frontier region off South Africa's "Wild Coast," an unspoiled stretch of coastline that provides habitat for migrating humpback whales.

Environmental groups (including Greenpeace) began suing Shell back in 2021 in an attempt to stop seismic surveying off the Wild Coast, asserting that it would be harmful to whales and to commercial fishermen. Shell countered that its plans were compliant with all applicable regulations, and that it would not be the first to conduct seismic work off South Africa's coastline.

A high court rejected the environmental groups' first lawsuit, but in late December 2021, the Makhanda High Court granted an injunction to prevent Shell from proceeding with the survey, citing the consultation rights of local communities. Given the ruling, Shell canceled the charter for seismic ship Amazon Warrior, and the vessel departed South Africa without performing work in January 2022.

In September 2022, the Makhanda High Court threw out Shell's exploration lease, finding that community notification and consultation requirements had not been met, among other alleged shortcomings. Shell appealed, but the ruling was upheld at the appellate level - though the appeals court left open a route to a later renewal of the lease.

In September 2025, South Africa's Constitutional Court took up the related matter of whether the government could renew Shell's lease, even though the lease had been rejected by the courts previously. On Friday, the top court ruled that it could not renew a lease that had been previously found procedurally flawed.

"Any other remedy would allow financial investment to outweigh grave constitutional violations and would signal that the rights of affected parties are subordinate to commercial interests. That is not what our Constitution envisages," the Constitutional Court ruled.

The termination of the lease renewal process brings Shell's avenues for appeal to a close. The company said in a statement that it remains committed to meaningful engagement in South Africa, and expressed optimism about the potential for the nation to gain more energy self-sufficiency.

The region of interest is known as the Orange Basin, and it extends across the maritime boundary into Namibian waters. Shell has been engaged in an active exploration effort on the Namibian side of the boundary - and with considerable success.