[article] sitting on a small fortune!

thomasj

http://royaldutchshellplc.com/2009/01/31/ireland-sitting-on-a-fortune-exclusive-eur5trillion-oil-field-could-defeat-recession-but-gloom-grows/

Is this the area to look at?

IRELAND: SITTING ON A FORTUNE; EXCLUSIVE EUR5trillion Oil Field Could Defeat Recession but Gloom Grows
Jan 31st, 2009 by John Donovan.
Friday, January 30, 2009 4:58 PM
Source: Daily Mirror)By TOM PRENDEVILLE

IRELAND has EUR5.4trillion of oil lying off the west coast, it was revealed yesterday.

The oil reserve is enough to pay off our national debt of EUR60billion almost a hundred times over and banish our recession woes for decades to come.

But contracts with foreign companies are preventing us from selling it and transforming us into the Saudi Arabia of Europe.

The state’s lawyers will have to renegotiate with the multinational firms or they will pocket all the profits.

A report by Petroleum Affairs Division of the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources stated: “The potential is of at least 10 billion barrels of oil lying off the west coast of Ireland.

“Well data indicate world-class source rocks. Volumetric assessment and expulsion modelling shows volumes of over 130 billion barrels of oil and 50 trillion cubic feet of gas.”

Most of the Irish oil and gas deposits have been pinpointed along an underwater ridge known as the Atlantic Margin which runs parallel to our western shore.

The Dunquin gas field, which is 200km off the coast of Kerry, contains 25 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 4,130 million barrels of oil.

This alone would meet our gas needs - at present consumption levels - for the next 62 years.

The Dunquin field is currently being developed by Exxon Mobil, and several other partners. The Spanish Point field, located 200km off the coast of Clare, has known reserves of one and a quarter trillion cubic feet of gas and 206 million barrels of oil.

Further north lies Corrib, Co Mayo, which has an estimated value of anywhere between EUR6billion to EUR50billion.

The field - which has been the scene of much controversy - is being developed by Shell, Marathon and Statoil.

Inland lies the Lough Allen basin, which is valued at EUR75billion and contains 9.4 trillion cubic feet of gas and 1.5 billion barrels of oil.

This vast field lies beneath Lough Allen and the foreshore area surrounding it and straddles counties Cavan, Leitrim, Roscommon and Sligo.

Local farmers who own this land have the potential to become gas millionaires.

But multi-national oil companies are likely to get all the money unless the state re-negotiates exploration contracts.

The firms who are harvesting the Corrib gas fields will only have to pay 25 per cent on the profit and most of this can be written- off against exploration and operating costs.

Although the new rate of tax is 40 per cent this rate only applies to new exploration licenses and does not cover the existing oil and gas finds. Fine Gael spokesman for energy and natural resources Simon Coveney said: “We are desperately in need of money.

“If we get a big find we need to make sure we get a decent return, and when you go above a certain find, a different return.

“There needs to be an incentive there too, because it costs EUR70million any time they do an exploration drill.

“The state cannot afford to do that so we leave it to the private sector. It is a fine balance and we need to be careful we don’t drive the exploration companies away.”

(c) 2009 Daily Mirror. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.

A service of YellowBrix, Inc.

source is http://www.istockanalyst.com/article/viewiStockNews/articleid/2997336

mike65

Thats not news to be fair - google earth has an exellent oil map of Ireland and you can see three (?) big fields off the west coast. Trouble is the depth and hostile seas pose a serious issue. As for the contracts - Ireland really needs a "Statoil" solution but how can the state buy out the current contracts?

thomasj

mike65 wrote: »

Thats not news to be fair - google earth has an exellent oil map of Ireland and you can see three (?) big fields off the west coast. Trouble is the depth and hostile seas pose a serious issue. As for the contracts - Ireland really needs a "Statoil" solution but how can the state buy out the current contracts?

It just goes the show, we had the chance during times of boom and blew it! we need this money desperately!

Actually mike have you a link to that google oil map? cheers!

thomasj

mike65 wrote: »

Thats not news to be fair

I think the fact that a government department has realised this is what makes this newsworthy! now if they can do something about it.....

mike65

If you have GE type in "oil fields ireland" and you should see the fields marked in blue with annotations.

thomasj

mike65 wrote: »

If you have GE type in "oil fields ireland" and you should see the fields marked in blue with annotations.

cheers mike, i see what you mean now. so is this a lost hope or can they renegotiate. This seems to be a storydoing the rounds for years but nothing has been done. having said that it is the first I have head of communications and marine on this. Do they normally release reports like this?

CiaranC

We should let them do the work, and then nationalise, a la old Hugo in Venezuela. As a bonus, we'll be kicked out of the EU!

thomasj

CiaranC wrote: »

We should let them do the work, and then nationalise, a la old Hugo in Venezuela. As a bonus, we'll be kicked out of the EU!

Youre bang on ciaran although i cant see europe letting us get away with that sort of opportunity!

Time Magazine

thomasj wrote: »

Youre bang on ciaran

I'm pretty sure he was joking. Anyway this is more After Hours than Economics...

thomasj

sorry put in the wrong forum. But a golden chance to help the country and private firms look set to take advantage of what is found if there is stuff found. :rolleyes:

Tabnabs

A number of problems with this oil & gas on our doorstep. Our successive governments have been happy to let foreign oil companies (and yes we have Irish companies that could be given breaks to do this) survey and test drill off the Irish coast. These companies find x amount of oil or gas, sit on their findings or else claim there isn't much and so licence fees remain deflated and essentially keep this reserve up their sleeves.

Then when the price of oil and gas rises enough, you will find that suddenly they are interested in drilling and establishing refineries. Oil & gas is a finite commodity and the North Sea is nearing the end of its working life. Deep water is no longer a barrier to exploration as they now work west of Shetland and off the Canadian coast in equally harsh conditions.

However, and here's the important bit. The state needs to ensure that any work carried out benefits not only the state coffers, but also the local communities and the Irish work force. The ships (which are all Dutch, British or Norwegian) which service the offshore industry are loading cargo in the Clyde in Scotland and not in Ireland (some small exceptions in Killybegs), I understand the refinery in Mayo will (eventually!) be manned with non Irish staff, similar to the debacle in the UK at the moment with Italians building a British power plant.

In the Faroes for example, I'm told that any ship working in the offshore industry there must have at least Faroese junior officers onboard in order to train up their domestic workforce to have the ability to do these jobs. In most other countries the licence granted to oil exploration companies is much shorter then the current Irish policy.

We are letting ourselves be done over very willingly and any treasure-trove out there will not be coming into Irish hands!

thomasj

and sadly again it exposes irish politics for what it really is! From the fortune that the private company NTR raised from owning the M50 through the coffers and the selling of it to the irish government right down to this do people really think decisions being made were made in the interests of the irish people?

Naos

At least we can expect the USA to come in and liberate us from our incompetant government any time soon. You know, defending freedom and all.