North West Shelf, Australia

Australia’s North West Shelf is Australia’s main hydrocarbon province and one of the world’s largest gas-producing areas. Much of the recent decades of my career has involved exploration in the North West Shelf basins for various client companies

In 1984, Robyn and I edited the Petroleum Exploration Society of Australia (PESA) publication called The North West Shelf, Australia. Our introduction paper provides a useful summary of the geography, geology and exploration history of the region. Many publication since, by PESA and others, have provided more detail and more recent developments but the 1984 ‘Old Testament’ continues to offer new explorers a good overview of this important petroleum province – thanks to the many authors who contributed the c40 papers for the book. More recent publications on the NWS are included in PESA’s West Australian Basins books, popularly referred to as WABs 1 (1994), WABS 2 (1998), WABS 3 (2002) and WABS 4 (2013), and in the annual APPEA journals.

In 2018, Ian Longley and I prepared and presented a 3-day course on the North West Shelf. Details of that course can be found here. Ian and I recently co-authored ‘The North West Shelf, Western Australia’s Superbasin in the 21st Century’ for the 4th volume of AAPG’s Superbasin Series. This detailed review of the exploration activity this century, set against the patterns and history of exploration in the past, is currently in press and will be posted here when available.

Attachments

Aussie North Rankin Discovery Was Game-Changer - AAPG Explorer Article 2011. — 314.1 KB PDF File Download
Introduction to the North West Shelf. — 1 MB PDF File Download
The "New"/Rediscovered liquids Rich Offshore Canning - Why it's There and are There Any More Hiding Out There? — 10.3 MB PDF File Download
Phoenix South: A New Petroleum System in the Bedout Sub-Basin. — 3 MB PDF File Download
The North West Shelf, Western Australia’s superbasin in the twenty-first century, American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, v. 107, no. 8, p1299-1367. — 9.6 MB PDF File Download