Petroleum geological summary of the 2012 offshore acreage release for petroleum exploration

2012 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Bernecker
Keyword(s):  
South Australia ◽  
Data Availability ◽  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
Free Access ◽  
Australian Government ◽  
Large Area ◽  
Offshore Area ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
Gippsland Basin

The Australian Government formally releases new offshore exploration areas at the annual APPEA conference. In 2012, 27 areas in nine offshore basins are being released for work program bidding. Closing dates for bid submissions are either six or twelve months after the release date, i.e. 8 November 2012 or 9 May 2013, depending on the exploration status in these areas and on data availability. As was the case in 2011, this year’s Release again covers a total offshore area of about 200,000 km2. The Release Areas are located in Commonwealth waters offshore Northern Territory, Western Australia, South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania (Fig. 1). Areas on the North West Shelf feature prominently again and include under-explored shallow water areas in the Arafura and Money Shoal basins and rank frontier deep water areas in the outer Browse and Roebuck basins as well as on the outer Exmouth Plateau. Following the recent uptake of exploration permits in the Bight Basin (Ceduna and Duntroon sub-basins), Australia’s southern margin is well represented in the 2012 Acreage Release. Three new areas in the Ceduna Sub-basin, four areas in the Otway Basin, one large area in the Sorell Basin and two areas in the eastern Gippsland Basin are on offer. Multiple industry nominations for this Acreage Release were received, confirming the healthy status of exploration activity in Australia. The Australian government continues to support these activities by providing free access to a wealth of geological and geophysical data.

Review of the 2009 offshore petroleum exploration release areas

2009 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 465
Author(s):  
Thomas Bernecker
Keyword(s):  
Deep Water ◽  
South Australia ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Data Availability ◽  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
Release Date ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
Release Area ◽  
Block Sizes

The Australian Government formally releases new offshore exploration areas at the annual APPEA conference. This year, 31 areas plus two special areas in five offshore basins are being released for work program bidding. Closing dates for bid submissions are either six or twelve months after the release date (i.e. 3 December 2009 and 29 April 2010), depending on the exploration status in these areas is and on data availability. The 2009 release areas are located in Commonwealth waters offshore Northern Territory, Western Australia, South Australia and Victoria, comprising intensively explored areas close to existing production as well as new frontiers. As usual, the North West Shelf features very prominently and is complimented by new areas along the southern margin, including frontier exploration areas in the Ceduna Sub-basin (Bight Basin) and the Otway Basin. The Bonaparte Basin is represented by one release area in the Malita Graben, while five areas are available in the Southern Browse Basin in an under-explored area of the basin. A total of 14 areas are being released in the Carnarvon Basin, with eight areas located in the Dampier Sub-basin, three small blocks in the Rankin Platform and three large blocks on the Northern Exmouth Plateau (these are considered a deep water frontier). In the south, six large areas are on offer in the Ceduna Sub-basin and five areas of varying sizes are being released in the Otway Basin, including a deep water frontier offshore Victoria. The special release areas are located in the Petrel Sub-basin, Bonaparte Basin offshore Northern Territory, and encompass the Turtle/Barnett oil discoveries. The 2009 offshore acreage release offers a wide variety of block sizes in shallow as well as deep water environments. Area selection has been undertaken in consultation with industry, the states and Territory. This year’s acreage release caters for the whole gamut of exploration companies given that many areas are close to existing infrastructure while others are located in frontier offshore regions. As part of Geoscience Australia’s Offshore Energy Security Program, new data has been acquired in offshore frontier regions and have yielded encouraging insights into the hydrocarbon prospectivity of the Ceduna-Sub-basin.

The 2010 Australian offshore release for petroleum exploration

2010 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
pp. 5
Author(s):  
Tom Bernecker
Keyword(s):  
South Australia ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Data Availability ◽  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
Release Date ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
New Frontier ◽  
Release Area ◽  
Block Sizes

The Australian Government formally releases new offshore exploration areas at the annual APPEA conference. In 2010, thirty-one areas in five offshore basins are being released for work program bidding. Closing dates for bid submissions are either six or twelve months after the release date—i.e. 11 November 2010 and 12 May 2011—depending on the exploration status in these areas and on data availability. The 2010 release areas are located in Commonwealth waters offshore Northern Territory, Western Australia and South Australia, comprising intensively explored areas close to existing production as well as new frontiers. The Westralian Superbasin along the North West Shelf continues to feature prominently, and is complimented by a new frontier area in offshore SW Australia (Mentelle Basin), as well as two areas in the Ceduna/Duntroon sub-basins in the eastern part of the Bight Basin. The Bonaparte Basin is represented by three areas in the Petrel Sub-basin and two areas in the Vulcan Sub-basin. Further southwest, four large areas are being released in the outer Roebuck Basin—a significantly under-explored region. This year, the Carnarvon Basin provides 16 release areas of which three are located in the Beagle Sub-basin, five in the Dampier Sub-basin, five in the Barrow Sub-basin, three on the Exmouth Plateau and three in the Exmouth Sub-basin. The largest singular release area covers much of the Mentelle Basin in offshore SW Australia, and two areas are available in the Ceduna and Duntroon sub-basins as part of South Australia’s easternmost section of the Bight Basin. The 2010 Offshore Acreage Release offers a wide variety of block sizes in shallow as well as deep water environments. Area selection has been undertaken in consultation with industry, the States and the Northern Territory. As part of Geoscience Australia’s Offshore Energy Security Program, new data has been acquired in offshore frontier regions parts of which are being published on the Mentelle Basin (Borissova et al, this volume).

The hydrocarbon potential of the 2015 Offshore Acreage Release Areas for petroleum exploration

2015 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 71
Author(s):  
Thomas Bernecker ◽  
Tehani Kuske ◽  
Bridgette Lewis ◽  
Tegan Smith
Keyword(s):  
Oil And Gas ◽  
Gas Production ◽  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
Hydrocarbon Potential ◽  
Large Area ◽  
Oil And Gas Production ◽  
North West ◽  
Work Program ◽  
Northern Carnarvon Basin ◽  
Gippsland Basin

The Australian Government formally releases new offshore exploration areas at the annual APPEA conference. These areas are located across various offshore hydrocarbon provinces ranging from mature basins with ongoing oil and gas production to exploration frontiers. A total of 23 areas are released for work-program bidding and six areas for cash bidding (Fig. 1). The two work-program bidding rounds will remain open until 29 October 2015 and 21 April 2016, respectively, while cash bid submissions will close on 4 February 2016. The 2015 Release Areas are located in 13 distinct geological provinces across eight basins and all were supported by industry nominations. Six areas are located in the Bonaparte Basin, two of which are cash bid areas over the Turtle/Barnett oil accumulations. In the Browse Basin, three areas in the Caswell Sub-basin and one area on the Yampi Shelf are released. In support of recent exploration activities and success, one large area has been gazetted in the central Roebuck Basin. The Northern Carnarvon Basin offering comprises 11 areas on the Exmouth Plateau and in the Dampier Sub-basin, including four for cash bidding. This year, the usual predominance of North West Shelf Release Areas is counterbalanced by seven large areas in the Bight, Otway, Sorell and Gippsland basins. This includes one area in the Ceduna Sub-basin, three areas in the deepwater Otway Basin, one area in the northern Sorell Basin and two areas in the southeastern Gippsland Basin. The nominations received for these areas highlights the industry’s interest in evaluating the hydrocarbon potential of Australia’s underexplored southern margin. Geoscience Australia continues to support industry activities by acquiring, interpreting and integrating pre-competitive datasets that are made freely available as part of the agency’s regional petroleum geological studies.

A petroleum geological overview of the 2013 offshore acreage release for petroleum exploration

2013 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Bernecker
Keyword(s):  
Geophysical Data ◽  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
Free Access ◽  
Australian Government ◽  
Open File ◽  
Work Program ◽  
The North ◽  
Data Coverage

The Australian Government formally releases new offshore exploration areas at the annual APPEA conference. The previous two releases were characterised by several large, gazetted areas in underexplored regions, a trend that is maintained this year with several frontier areas comprising more than 100 graticular blocks on offer. The recent uptake of new exploration permits in the Bight Basin, the offshore North Perth Basin, and the Roebuck Basin indicates a continuing strong industry interest in offshore frontier exploration. A total of 31 areas in 13 geological provinces are formally released in 2013, and work program bids are invited for two rounds closing on 21 November 2013, and 22 May 2014. Area gazettal was, again, well supported by industry nominations. The areas on offer are represented by an even mix of shallow and deepwater areas, as well as by areas close and distant to previous discoveries and producing fields. The Northern Carnarvon, Browse, and Bonaparte basins dominate new exploration opportunities in the 2013 release, while only four areas were gazetted in the North Perth, Otway, and Gippsland basins. These also deserve attention as they have exploration potential in underexplored parts of the basins and offer opportunities to test new play concepts. Data coverage varies from being excellent in more mature areas to sparse in underexplored areas such as the North Perth Basin. The Australian Government continues to assist offshore exploration activities by providing free access to a wealth of open-file geological and geophysical data.

ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW 2000

2001 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 80
Author(s):  
S.J. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Management ◽  
New Technology ◽  
Petroleum Industry ◽  
South Australia ◽  
Environmental Reporting ◽  
North West ◽  
Natural Gas Pipelines ◽  
The North ◽  
Timor Sea ◽  
Epbc Act

Last year the petroleum industry witnessed the enactment of new legislation both at Commonwealth and State levels. The principal legislative change to environmental management was the introduction of the Commonwealth Government’s Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Act, 2000 (EPBC Act). South Australia and Victoria also implemented new Petroleum Acts and/ or Regulations.Construction of the Eastern Gas Pipeline was also completed last year, whilst preliminary approvals and environmental assessment continues for the Papua New Guinea, Timor Sea and Tasmania Natural Gas pipelines. Offshore exploration continued, particularly in the North West Shelf, Otway Basin, Timor Sea and Bass Strait.Other critical areas of environmental management included greenhouse gases, national pollution inventory reporting and the increasing requirements for environmental approval and management under various state environmental legislation.This paper provides an overview of environmental developments in the petroleum industry during the year 2000, in particular, the implication of new legislation, new technology, e-commerce and a greater focus on environmental reporting.

THE ROLE OF AMPLITUDE VERSUS OFFSET TECHNOLOGY IN PROMOTING OFFSHORE PETROLEUM EXPLORATION IN AUSTRALIA

2007 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 163 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. E. Williamson ◽  
F. Kroh
Keyword(s):  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
Gas Field ◽  
North West ◽  
Preliminary Results ◽  
Exmouth Plateau ◽  
The North ◽  
Amplitude Versus Offset ◽  
Cable Lines ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Amplitude Versus

Amplitude versus offset (AVO) technology has proved itself useful in petroleum exploration in various parts of the world, particularly for gas exploration. To determine if modern AVO compliant processing could identify potential anomalies for exploration of open acreage offshore Australia, Geoscience Australia reprocessed parts of four publicly available long cable lines. These lines cover two 2006 acreage release areas on the Exmouth Plateau and in the Browse Basin on the North West Shelf. An earlier study has also been done on two publicly available long cable lines from Geoscience Australia’s Bremer Basin study and cover areas from the 2005 frontier acreage release on the southern margin. The preliminary results from these three reprocessing efforts produced AVO anomalies and were made publicly available to assist companies interested in assessing the acreage. The results of the studies and associated data are available from Geoscience Australia at the cost of transfer.The AVO data from the Exmouth Plateau show AVO anomalies including one that appears to be at the Jurassic level of the reservoir in the Jansz/Io supergiant gas field in adjacent acreage to the north. The AVO data from the Caswell Sub-basin of the Browse Basin show an AVO anomaly at or near the stratigraphic zone of the Brecknock South–1 gas discovery to the north. The geological settings of strata possibly relating to two AVO anomalies in the undrilled Bremer Basin are in the Early Cretaceous section, where lacustrine sandstones are known to occur. The AVO anomalies from the three studies are kilometres in length along the seismic lines.These preliminary results from Geoscience Australiaand other AVO work that has been carried out by industry show promise that AVO compliant processing has value—particularly for gas exploration offshore Australia—and that publicly available long-cable data can be suitable for AVO analysis.

PESA Australian exploration review 2018

2019 ◽  
Vol 59 (2) ◽  
pp. 493
Author(s):  
D. Lockhart ◽  
D. Spring
Keyword(s):  
Oil And Gas ◽  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
3D Seismic ◽  
The North ◽  
Second Year ◽  
Gippsland Basin ◽  
2D And 3D ◽  
Conventional Oil ◽  
Exploration Activity ◽  
Offshore Petroleum

Available data for 2018 indicates that exploration activity is on the rise in Australia, compared to 2017, and this represents a second year of growth in exploration activity in Australia. There has been an increase in area under licence by 92 000 km2, reversing the downward trend in area under licence that commenced in 2014. Since 2016, exploratory drilling within Australia has seen a continued upward trend in both the number of wells drilled and the percentage of total worldwide. Onshore, 77 conventional exploration and appraisal wells were spudded during the year. Offshore, exploration and appraisal drilling matched that seen in 2017, with five new wells spudded: two in the Roebuck Basin, two in the Gippsland Basin and one in the North Carnarvon Basin. Almost 1500 km of 2D seismic and over 10 000 km2 of 3D seismic were acquired within Australia during 2018, accounting for 2.4% and 3.9% of global acquisition, respectively. This represents an increase in the amount of both 2D and 3D seismic acquired in Australia compared with 2017. Once the 2017 Offshore Petroleum Acreage Release was finalised, seven new offshore exploration permits were awarded as a result. A total of 12 bids were received for round one of the 2018 Offshore Petroleum Exploration Release, demonstrating an increase in momentum for offshore exploration in Australia. The permits are in Commonwealth waters off Western Australia, Victoria and the Ashmore and Cartier islands. In June 2018, the Queensland Government announced the release of 11 areas for petroleum exploration acreage in onshore Queensland, with tenders closing in February/March 2019; a further 11 areas will be released in early 2019. The acreage is a mix of coal seam gas and conventional oil and gas. Victoria released five areas in the offshore Otway Basin within State waters. In the Northern Territory, the moratorium on fracking was lifted in April, clearing the way for exploration to recommence in the 2019 dry season. With the increase in exploration has come an increase in success, with total reserves discovered within Australia during 2018 at just under 400 million barrels of oil equivalent, representing a significant increase from 2017. In 2018, onshore drilling resulted in 18 new discoveries, while offshore, two new discoveries were made. The most notable exploration success of 2018 was Dorado-1 drilled in March by Quadrant and Carnarvon Petroleum in the underexplored Bedout Sub-basin. Dorado is the largest oil discovery in Australia of 100 million barrels, or over, since 1996 and has the potential to reinvigorate exploration in the region.

PETROLEUM EXPLORATION PREVIEW FOR 1967

1967 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 16
Author(s):  
M. A. Condon
Keyword(s):  
Financial Incentives ◽  
Petroleum Exploration ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
Oil Markets ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Timor Sea ◽  
The Government ◽  
Average Size ◽  
The Cost

Exploration for petroleum in Australia paused in 1966 and this pause is likely to continue in 1967.The number of wells drilled and seismic activity will both be slightly less in 1967 than in 1966, but the work will generally be directed to more specific targets. The cost of exploration will be somewhat higher than in 1966.During the year off-shore drilling should increase and it is expected that five mobile rigs will be drilling in the offshore areas by the end of the year. The immediate structural targets available for these rigs are in the Gippsland, Bass and Otway Basins (Victoria-Tasmania), the North-West Shelf and Timor Sea-Bonaparte Gulf, and in the Gulf of Papua.Onshore exploration will be concentrated in the western Australian basins, the Surat Basin, the central Great Artesian Basin, and the Gidgealpa region of the southwestern Great Artesian Basin.The success or otherwise of the off-shore drilling will determine the rate of exploration over the next few years. If important discoveries are made off-shore, these may and probably would result in more intensive exploration of the same stratigraphic intervals onshore.The exploration patterns of Australia and several other countries before and after first commercial discovery are compared. This indicates that Australian discovery came early, as compared with other countries, where production has developed since the war, but that post-discovery effort in Australia has been very much less. The main obvious differences appear to be that in Australia the average size of the exploration concession is very much larger and the number of operators (having regard to the areas concerned) is much smaller, than in the other successful countries.There has been a gradual movement towards reducing the size of operating areas in Australia either by obligatory relinquihment or by farmout, but if discoveries are to be made at a satisfactory rate more operators are needed in every basin.The economic environment of Australia vis-a-vis Middle East oil and oil markets is probably the main basic reason for the peculiar exploratory pattern, which has impelled the Government to provide financial incentives to encourage exploration and development.

scholarly journals Self-gravitating filament formation from shocked flows: velocity gradients across filaments

2020 ◽  
Vol 494 (3) ◽  
pp. 3675-3685 ◽  
Author(s):  
Che-Yu Chen ◽  
Lee G Mundy ◽  
Eve C Ostriker ◽  
Shaye Storm ◽  
Arnab Dhabal
Keyword(s):  
Velocity Gradient ◽  
Unit Length ◽  
Selection Effect ◽  
Major Axis ◽  
Large Area ◽  
North West ◽  
Preferred Direction ◽  
The North ◽  
Velocity Gradients ◽  
Field Lines

ABSTRACT In typical environments of star-forming clouds, converging supersonic turbulence generates shock-compressed regions, and can create strongly magnetized sheet-like layers. Numerical magnetohydrodynamic simulations show that within these post-shock layers, dense filaments and embedded self-gravitating cores form via gathering material along the magnetic field lines. As a result of the preferred-direction mass collection, a velocity gradient perpendicular to the filament major axis is a common feature seen in simulations. We show that this prediction is in good agreement with recent observations from the CARMA Large Area Star Formation Survey (CLASSy), from which we identified several filaments with prominent velocity gradients perpendicular to their major axes. Highlighting a filament from the north-west part of Serpens South, we provide both qualitative and quantitative comparisons between simulation results and observational data. In particular, we show that the dimensionless ratio Cv ≡ Δvh2/(GM/L), where Δvh is half of the observed perpendicular velocity difference across a filament, and M/L is the filament’s mass per unit length, can distinguish between filaments formed purely due to turbulent compression and those formed due to gravity-induced accretion. We conclude that the perpendicular velocity gradient observed in the Serpens South north-west filament can be caused by gravity-induced anisotropic accretion of material from a flattened layer. Using synthetic observations of our simulated filaments, we also propose that a density-selection effect may explain observed subfilaments (one filament breaking into two components in velocity space) as reported in recent observations.

scholarly journals Leisure centre entrance charges and physical activity participation in England

2017 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 379-388
Author(s):  
F Ward ◽  
E C Halliday ◽  
B Barr ◽  
J Higgerson ◽  
V Holt
Keyword(s):  
Physical Activity ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Free Access ◽  
Local Authorities ◽  
North West ◽  
The Public ◽  
The North ◽  
Key Factor ◽  
Leisure Facilities

Summary Reducing or eliminating the cost to the public of using leisure facilities is one tool that local authorities have available to reduce inequalities in physical activity (PA). There is limited evidence about the effect of leisure entrance charges and their impact on participation. This study aimed to ascertain how facility pricing influenced the decisions people made about how to pay and what to pay for and how, in turn, these decisions impacted on participation for different groups. A total of 83 members of the public living in 4 local authorities in the North West of England were involved in focus groups or individual interviews. The results show that cost was a key factor which influenced PA participation in low income neighbourhoods. In practise, however, the majority of service users navigated the range of prices or payment options to find one that was suitable rather than simply reporting whether leisure was affordable or not. Whilst pre-paid options (e.g. direct debit memberships) encouraged participation, entrance charges incurred each time an individual participated had a negative impact on frequency but were a convenient way of paying for occasional use or for people who were unable to afford a pre-paid option. Free access also helped people who could not afford pre-paid membership to exercise regularly as well as incentivizing non-users to try activities. The research concluded that policies that include components of free access and offer more flexible payment options are most likely to contribute to reducing inequalities in PA.

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