Area NT07-2
Money Shoal Basin
Exploration History
Petroleum exploration in the Arafura Sea region began in the 1920s when several boreholes were drilled on Elcho Island in response to reported bitumen strandings. In the 1960s and early 1970s, stratigraphic drilling occurred on Bathurst and Melville islands (McLennan et al, 1990). During this time Shell Development (Australia) was awarded exploration permits covering the western region of the Arafura Sea and drilled the first well in the offshore Arafura Basin, Money Shoal 1 (1971). This well was drilled primarily to test the Mesozoic Money Shoal Basin sequence. At the same time, Aquitaine was operating in the central southern region of the Arafura Sea. The two operators carried out extensive mapping based on seismic data and defined the Goulburn Graben as an important structural feature. Lynedoch 1, to the west of the release area, was drilled in 1973.
The next phase of exploration occurred in the early 1980s, with several
companies operating in the region, including Diamond Shamrock, Esso, Petrofina
and Sion Resources. A number of wells were drilled at this time, all of
which tested the Palaeozoic Arafura Basin sequence. Petrofina drilled two
wells, Arafura 1 (1983) and Goulburn 1 (1985). Arafura 1 recorded important
oil shows over a 425 m depth range in the Devonian and Ordovician sections
and still provides the most important Palaeozoic stratigraphic control in
the basin. The company also mapped a number of large fault-related closures
that remain untested (Miyazaki and McNeil, 1998). Esso drilled two wells,
Tasman 1 (1983), which targeted a fault block on a domal feature originally
interpreted as salt-related, and Torres 1 (1983), which targeted a prominent
Palaeozoic anticline. Diamond Shamrock drilled Kulka 1 (1984), which provides
important stratigraphic control for the Late Palaeozoic and Mesozoic sections.
A third phase of petroleum exploration by BHP Petroleum in the late 1980s
and early 1990s targeted mostly Mesozoic plays in the Goulburn Graben. The
exploration program included an extensive 17,000 km seismic survey, a regional
aeromagnetic survey, and the drilling of three exploration wells, Tuatara
1 (1990), Chameleon 1 (1991) and Cobra 1A (1993). Tuatara 1 targeted a faulted
anticline within Jurassic Troughton Group equivalents. During the early
1990s Geoscience Australia (then the Bureau of Mineral Resources) acquired
a total of 5342 km of regional deep seismic data across the Arafura Basin
(Figure 10).
In the past 10 years, several exploration activities have contributed to the available dataset and have high-graded the prospectivity of the region. These include, for example, non-exclusive regional 2D seismic data sets by TGS Nopec in 1998 and Veritas DGC in 2002, a 3728 km regional 2D seismic survey acquired for Nexen Petroleum Australia as part of their exploration commitment, and Synthetic Aperture Radar acquisition and interpretation across the region by Infoterra in 2003. Lynedoch 2 was drilled in 1998 and encountered a tight gas column in the Plover Formation, which had originally been suspected from the results of Lynedoch 1. Tyche 1 (2000) was unsuccessful, but the drilling of the Abadi 1, 2 and 3 wells in Indonesian waters (Yui, 2003), and of Caldita 1 in NT/P61 resulted in the discovery of large-scale gas accumulations.
Relevant Wells Listing
| Well | Operator | Year | Total Depth (m) | Hydrocarbons |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arafura 1 | Petrofina Explor | 1983 | 3635 | Gas flowed on test, oil shows |
| Chameleon 1 | BHP Petroleum | 1991 | 2179 | Oil indication |
| Caldita 1 | ConocoPhillips Exploration Australia Pty Ltd | 2005 | 4037 | Proven gas zone |
| Caldita 2 | ConocoPhillips Exploraiton Australia Pty Ltd | 2006 | N/A | Drilling at time of publication |
| Cobra 1 | BHP Petroleum Pty Ltd | 1993 | 409 | No shows |
| Cobra 1A | BHP Petroleum Pty Ltd | 1993 | 2542 | Oil indication |
| Goulburn 1 | Petrofina Explor | 1986 | 1300 | Oil recovered |
| Lynedoch 1 | Shell Development (Australia) Pty Ltd | 1973 | 3967 | Strong gas indications |
| Lynedoch 2 | Shell Development (Australia) Pty Ltd | 1998 | 4225 | Gas flowed on test |
| Kulka 1 | Diamond Shamrock Oil Company (Australia) | 1984 | 3998 | Oil indication |
| Money Shoal 1 | Shell Development (Aust.) Ltd | 1971 | 2590.1 | Oil indication |
| Tasman 1 | Esso Explor and Prod Aust Ltd | 1983 | 2720 | Oil indication |
| Torres 1 | Esso Explor and Prod Aust Ltd | 1983 | 2758 | No shows |
| Tuatara 1 | BHP Petroleum | 1990 | 3875 | Oil indication |