southern georgina, page-5

bit of a read Rayz. Geoscience Australia currently working in Georgina Basin.

http://www.pnronline.com.au/article.php/291/2552

A new look at Australia's oil rocks

From 2010 to 2012, the onshore basin area under exploration licence nearly doubled and several major international companies have joined local explorers in their endeavours to unlock the potential of Australian Proterozoic and early Paleozoic petroleum systems. The roll call of explorers investigating the Larapintine and older basins includes Armour Energy drilling in the Proterozoic McArthur Basin; in the Georgina Basin Norway's Statoil with Canada-based partner PetroFrontier and France's Total with Central Petroleum; and in the Canning Basin, Buru has been joined by Mitsubishi of Japan, and ConocoPhillips has partnered with New Standard.

Well over a $100 million has been invested to test the worth of these old rocks and much more may be spent depending on the success of a series of staged exploration programs.

Pre-competitive government geoscience at the federal, state and territory level is also assessing the potential of some of Australia's oldest petroleum systems. Geoscience Australia is currently undertaking a preliminary data compilation and synthesis study in the Georgina Basin. The work is being progressed with the assistance of the Geological Surveys of Queensland and the Northern Territory and will inform an assessment of the unconventional hydrocarbon resources of the basin. Future work includes an assessment of the Centralian Superbasin, while continental-scale work will provide new syntheses of Australian source rocks and palaeogeography.