Archives for August 2018

Teen girl bags gold medal for Australia at Earth Science world games

28/08/2018 Posted by Dale

Rebecca Whittle, a Year 11 student from Abbotsleigh high school in Sydney, has won a gold medal at the International Earth Science Olympiad in Thailand, securing Australia’s best gold medal performance at the UNESCO-sanctioned International Science Olympiads since 2009. Rebecca competed against more than 140 students from 38 countries to win gold, finishing in the top 10 per cent of Earth Science students in the world. Her medal is the second gold for Australia at this year’s International Science Olympiads, following a gold-medal performance by Sydney Grammar School student Hugo McCahon-Boersma at the International Physics Olympiad in July. “This double…

FAR finalises well location for exploration program in Gambia

27/08/2018 Posted by Dale

FAR Limited has selected its final well location for the upcoming Samo-1 well in its Gambian exploration programme. This follows reprocessing and interpretation of 3D seismic data, detailed mapping of the Samo Prospect and detailed well engineering, FAR announced recently. The Samo Prospect lies immediately to the south and along trend from the giant SNE oil field in Senegal – a trend which has so far seen nine successful exploration and appraisal wells (at 100% success rate). The Samo-1 well will be located in approximately 1,017m water depth and 112km offshore Gambia in the highly prospective Mauritania-SenegalGuinea-Bissau-Conakry Basin. The Samo…

APPEA: New Ministers but same energy policy mountains to climb

27/08/2018 Posted by Dale

The Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association (APPEA) has congratulated Australia’s new Minister for Energy, the Hon Angus Taylor and also welcomed the reappointment of Senator Matt Canavan as Minister for Resources and Northern Australia. “APPEA looks forward to working with Mr Taylor. He has been given a huge policy challenge,” APPEA Chief Executive Dr Malcolm Roberts said. “Mr Taylor’s extensive commercial understanding will be critical in finding solutions to the competing arms of containing prices, maintaining reliable supply and attracting new investment to the energy sector. Australia’s oil and gas industry welcomes the opportunity to work with the Minister.…

Gazprom will be the big spenders on global oil and gas projects to 2025

27/08/2018 Posted by Dale

Gazprom, China Petrochemical Corp (Sinopec) and Royal Dutch Shell are predicted to be the big global spenders on planned and announced projects among oil and gas companies. That is according to data and analytics company, GlobalData, which revealed that Gazprom tops the list with estimated capital expenditure of US$160bn expected to be spent on 84 oil and gas projects globally to 2025. Sinopec and Royal Dutch Shell follow with US$87bn (74 projects) and US$86bn (91 projects) respectively. The company’s report: ‘H1 2018 Top Global Oil and Gas Companies Planned Projects and Capital Expenditure Outlook’ shows that in the upstream sector,…

Dorado oil well discovery is right off the top Shelf

21/08/2018 Posted by Dale

Carnarvon Petroleum has announced that 171 million barrels of oil discovered at the Dorado well represented “one of the largest oil resources ever found on the North West Shelf”. The Perth-based explorer said oil fields of this scale were not often found, with the last large field discovery on the North West Shelf occurring about 30 years ago. “It is common for additional resources to be discovered in the surrounding area after a large discovery. In this regard we expect to provide the market with further details on prospects identified by the play concept now proven at Dorado, that we…

Bass says steady oil prices piqued production in July

21/08/2018 Posted by Dale

Melbourne-based oil and gas producer Bass Oil says continued high monthly average oil prices of US$68.52 had piqued performance at its 55%-owned Tangai-Sukananti oil field onshore Sumatra, Indonesia, in July. The company said during July production volumes had totalled 11,350 barrels of oil (6,243 barrels net to Bass) and sales volumes 11,628 barrels of oil. However, production and sales had been impacted by scale problems at production wells. Bass said a remediation program underway was expected to restore daily production levels to those achieved in May, “with a strong full year (31 December 18) of oil production still expected”. The…

Physicist appointed as CSIRO Chief Scientist

20/08/2018 Posted by Dale

Australia’s national science agency has appointed Dr Cathy Foley to the position of CSIRO Chief Scientist – a unique role which will help champion science, its impact and contribution to the world. Dr Foley is a world-renowned physicist and science leader most noted for her work developing superconducting devices and systems which have assisted in unearthing over $6 billion in minerals worldwide. Dr Foley will start in the role at the end of September. She said her priority will be promoting science, STEM and women in science. “Australia’s future prosperity will be fuelled by science,” Dr Foley said. “Science which…

MGPalaeo and Petrosys to expand GPinfo’s Capabilities

20/08/2018 Posted by Dale

MGPalaeo, Australian biostratigraphic experts, and Petrosys, an industry leader in mapping, surface-modeling and data-management software solutions, have signed an agreement that will allow data from MGPaleo’s AUSTRALIS™ geological database to be made available within the GPinfo data visualisation and manipulation package. In a media release, MGPalaeo announced that from August 2018, GPinfo subscribers will be able to view a high-level summary of all available geological data (biostratigraphy, lithostratigraphy, and sequence stratigraphic picks, plus wireline logs, checkshot surveys, deviation data, and more) within MGPalaeo’s AUSTRALIS database. This currently covers approximately 2000 wells across the North West Shelf, and further wells from…

Ironbark takes its Cue for a delayed crescendo

13/08/2018 Posted by Dale

Cue Energy has been granted a 12-month extension and suspension on exploration permit WA-359-P, host to the Ironbark gas prospect offshore Western Australia, entailing work commitment deferrals. The Melbourne headquartered oil and gas company said the National Offshore Petroleum Titles Administrator had notified it of the extension, which was to allow Cue to time for detailed well planning using newly available data and preparing for drilling the Ironbark-1 well, which is targeted for 2019. “The WA-359-P minimum work requirements included the variation to Permit Year 4 for a Detailed PSDM Pore Pressure Study, which had recently been completed,” Cue Energy…

Wood wins new contract for Scarborough gas field development

13/08/2018 Posted by Dale

Wood has been awarded a new contract by Woodside to support the execution of concept definition for the proposed Scarborough upstream development, offshore Western Australia. Wood said secured under a long-standing master services agreement, this latest contract extends the company’s 35-year relationship with Woodside across their asset portfolio. Concept definition level engineering associated with the floating production unit, subsea umbilicals, risers and flowlines, flow assurance and overall system integration of the upstream development, will be delivered by Wood’s specialist field development studies team in Houston, US and Perth, Australia. Bob MacDonald, CEO of Wood’s Specialist Technical Solutions business said: “The…