Gas in Spits­ber­gen?

Gas in Spits­ber­gen? Oil and gas have been loo­ked for mul­ti­ple times sin­ce the 1960, and not­hing of eco­no­mic value had been found so far. It did not seem a rele­vent ques­ti­on any­mo­re, at least onshore.

Until recent­ly, when gas was found by pure coin­ci­dence in quan­ti­ties that has cau­sed rene­wed inte­rest and could actual­ly lead to pro­duc­tion in the future. It was during a rese­arch dril­ling for the CO2 sto­rage pro­ject in Advent­da­len (see “Lon­gye­ar­by­en CO2 neu­tral?” in spitsbergen-svalbard.com-news from May 2013) that gas star­ted to flow out from the well with a con­stant pres­su­re of 25 bar. The source rock is a shale at a depth of 700 meters. The owner of the area is Store Nor­ske, the mining com­pa­ny that is run­ning the coal mines in the same area (mine 7) and in Sveagru­va.

The­re is, howe­ver, still a long way to go befo­re any pro­duc­tion might poten­ti­al­ly start. Sub­stan­ti­al and expen­si­ve explo­ra­ti­ve dril­ling is nee­ded to inves­ti­ga­te the natu­re and volu­me of the occur­rence. If Store Nor­ske is able and wil­ling to invest hea­vi­ly seems at least curr­ent­ly unli­kely: the com­pa­ny is curr­ent­ly in a dif­fi­cult eco­no­mic­al situa­ti­on.

It would be a twist of iro­ny if reser­ach within a pro­ject desi­gned to make the ener­gy pro­duc­tion in Lon­gye­ar­by­en CO2-neu­tral would lead to the pro­duc­tion of even more fos­sil ener­gy in Spits­ber­gen.

Source: Petro.no

Do you agree that spitsbergen-svalbard.com is a gre­at re­source for any arc­tic enthu­si­ast?

Ever­y­thing is available for free, no pay­wall, no regis­tra­ti­on, no paid adver­ti­sing, and all this in spi­te of con­stant cos­ts and effort. Plea­se help us to keep it that way, wit­hout pay­wall and paid ads, and sup­port us through Ste­ady!