THE Department of Mines and Petroleum executive director Jeff Haworth was in Bunbury last week to talk about gas exploration which is set to take place in the South West.
The department is responsible for the management and regulation of onshore petroleum and geothermal industries in WA and Mr Haworth said he had 40 years of experience in the industry.
Mr Haworth said Bunbury Energy was the preferred company which were undergoing native title negotiations before a title to commence work was issued.
Mr Haworth said once negotiations were complete they would look at whether circumstances or financials had changed for Bunbury Energy before they issued a title.
As part of the conditions, Bunbury Energy provided a detailed working program and committed to a 2D seismic survey.
“They plan to do that along road reserves then depending on the results there is potential for an exploration well in five years from now," he said.
“That will be dependent on what they find this is a very under explored area as far petroleum resources are concerned and previous studies have found nothing exciting except Whicher Range.”
Whicher Range was established near Busselton in 1968 but no company has been able to get a successful economically viable flow out of the wells.
Mr Haworth said there was one to five trillion cubic feet of gas in the reserve at Whicher Range which CalEnergy was trying to determine if they could extract an economical flow.
“A trillion cubic feet of gas is enough to power electricity for a population of one million people for 20 years and our domestic consumption of gas is such that it would last such a long time,” he said.
A gas exploration licence will likely be issued in parts of Bunbury, Busselton and Shires of Capel, Dardanup and Donnybrook-Balingup.
Have your say: Will a gas industry benefit the South West? emma.kirk@fairfaxmedia.com.au.
