The Petroleum Exploration Society of Australia (PESA WA) held its October Technical Lunch on 16 October 2025 Parmelia Hilton Perth, featuring a presentation by Chris Watts. The event attracted around 50 attendees from across the upstream sector, including representatives from Shell, Woodside, Santos, Chevron, and other leading energy companies in the Perth Basin.Chris delivered an informative and well-structured presentation highlighting the geological evolution of the Northern Perth Basin and the implications for exploration and resource development. His talk generated strong interest and engagement among participants.
PESA Gazette
WA YP event
PESA hosted a very successful YP event after the Australasian Exploration Geoscience Conference (AEGC) conference in Perth in September jointly with AIG, SPE and ASEG.
With over 70 attendees from both Perth and interstate, it was a wonderful evening of networking with both familiar and new faces.
A big thank you to our panellists who all volunteered their time after a packed week presenting at the conference: Ishtar Barranco (CCS Geologist, Chevron), Donna Sewell (Consulting Geologist, AIG WA Brach Chair) and Richard Lilly (Exploration Geologist, The University of Adelaide)
Vale Rowley Butters
Article prepared by Don Poynton who first met Rowley in 1972
(Accompanying photo from PESA News No 75, April/May 2005)
PESA Meritorious Service Awardee, Rowley Edward Butters passed away peacefully on Sunday 12 October, aged 87.
In the April/May 2005 issue of PESA News, newly elected PESA Federal President Dave Cliff wrote, “The biggest change for PESA will be the retirement of Rowley Butters as the society’s Secretariat. Rowley has been with the organization since its inception as the APEA Profession Division in 1968 when he was press-ganged into being WA Branch Treasurer”.
Rowley joined the industry as accountant with WAPET in the mid-1960s.
AEGC 2025 – Another Success for the Co-Convening Societies
PESA were thrilled to welcome nearly 1400 participants to the Australian Exploration Geoscience Conference (AEGC) 2025 in Perth at the beginning of September across the exhibition, technical program and training courses offered.
The conference is the largest geoscience conference in Australia and is hosted by AIG, PESA and ASEG. Originally developed in response to member feedback that they would like a collaborative event, the current format evolved from the 2016 ASEG-PESA Geophysics conference.
Geopitch Winner Courtney Berry Reflects on AEGC Experience
The PESA AEGC Student Travel Bursaries have been designed to provide financial assistance to students and early career geoscientists to attend the AEGC by helping to cover travel expenses and conference registration fees. Open to PESA members giving an oral, poster or Geopitch competition presentation, they offer a member per state the chance to attend this conference for a significantly reduced price.
This year, Courtney Berry, a student at Curtin University currently based in Brisbane was one of the lucky winners of the award. Read on to hear more about Courtney’s experience at AEGC.
“The highlight of my AEGC experience in Perth this year was taking part in the GeoPitch competition.
VIC/TAS Meeting Updates
PESA VIC/TAS branch is actively working on its schedule of meetings and will bring some in-house events to the membership ASAP. Meanwhile, some of the branch membership are able to access meetings of our sister geoscience societies in Melbourne. On Friday 10th October, a few PESA Victorians attended the SPE lunchtime talk given by the SPE Distinguished Lecturer Mike Byrne, of Elemental Energies. Mike spoke on the topic of CO2 injection well design with the subtitle "The same, but different".
Notice of Membership Fee Increase
The PESA board advises that there will be a small membership fee increase, effective from December 2025. The fee increase of approximately 2.5% will account for CPI increase and will ensure that PESA can continue to provide members with a range of high value services. Small fee increases, consistent with inflation, ensure that larger more impactful fee increases are not required in the future.
The fees below will apply to both new and renewing members.
Please note that there are no changes to Retired or Graduate membership fees, and Student membership will continue to be free.
Australian Natural Hydrogen Conference 2025
It’s a crucial year for the potential commercialisation of natural hydrogen, and the second Australian Natural Hydrogen Conference October 21-23 in the Adelaide Hills promises to shed new light on this emerging energy source.
With a handful of companies worldwide having confirmed high levels of natural hydrogen in the ground, all are now racing to prove they can commercialise the zero-carbon resource, and the conference, put on by the Natural Hydrogen Association of Australia, has some of the industry’s heavyweights fronting attendees.
Since the inaugural Natural Hydrogen Association of Australia conference in 2024, the game has changed.
Carbon Loop #13
Read the full newsletter here
Hello and welcome to The Carbon Loop — a newsletter by the CCUSNA dedicated to highlighting the Australian carbon capture, utilisation and storage industry
The Federal Government has dropped a suite of Net Zero strategies covering key parts of the economy: transport, resources, industry, built environment, agriculture and land, and electricity. Together with the overarching Net Zero Plan, these reports provide the most detailed picture yet of how Australia expects to meet its emissions commitments.
There’s a bajillion pages to get through and I’m a long way from having an informed opinion, but my initial hot take is a bit: Hmm.. really?
WA Basin’s workshop to be held 1st-2nd Dec at Curtin University
The 2025 Basins Workshop will take place on Monday 1 and Tuesday 2 December 2025 at Curtin University, Perth in association with PESA WA Branch. The aim of the workshop is to provide an informal forum for the exchange of insights and ideas regarding the evolution of sedimentary basins in Australia and around the world, and the diverse resources they contain, including hydrocarbons, minerals, geothermal energy, natural hydrogen, and the potential for CO2 and hydrogen storage.
Talks are limited to 10 minutes in duration, with ample time for discussion, so we are looking for thought provoking ideas, rather than polished conference presentations.