Doug Ashbury
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Oct 23/00) - The Northwest Territories is one of the last oil and gas frontiers in North America.

Resource companies could spend about $1 billion over the next five years exploring for oil and natural gas in the territory. Many targets are in the Mackenzie Delta and Sahtu regions.

Four parcels of land -- three Crown calls in the Mackenzie Delta and Sahtu and one by the Inuvialuit in its settlement region -- have already resulted spending commitments totalling $782.7 million.

Driving the search is a projected increase in North American demand for natural gas.

Under nine-year licences, resource companies are required to drill at least one well and spend bid amounts over the first five years which extends the land tenure for the another four years.

Existing licences in the Sahtu, Mackenzie Delta and Fort Liard area, as well as work on significant discovery licences in the NWT, will probably push the total to the $1 billion mark over the next half-decade.

Below is a listing of the bids:

Delta 2000 bids

Beaufort Sea-Mackenzie Delta August 2000 winning bids, totalling $466.6 million, include:

• Shell Canada bid $35.0 million for parcel one
• Amoco Canada (now BP Canada Energy Company), Burlington Resources and Chevron Canada, bid $76.7 million for parcel two
• Petro-Canada and Anderson Resources bid $46.5 million for parcel three
• No bids were made on parcel four
• Petro-Canada and Anderson Resources bid $81.9 million for parcel five
• Anadarko Canada bid $2.4 million for parcel six
• Anderson Resources bid $77.6 million for parcel seven
• Anderson Resources bid $57.0 million for parcel eight
• Anderson Resources bid $21.7 million for parcel nine
• Anderson resources bid $67.8 million for parcel 10

Delta 1999 bids

Beaufort Sea-Mackenzie Delta September 1999 bids, totalling $183.2 million, include:

• Poco Petroleums and Burlington Resources bid $35.6 million for parcel one
• Poco and Burlington bid $42.4 million on parcel two
• Petro-Canada and Anderson Resources bid $51.8 million on parcel three
• Petro-Canada and Anderson bid $53.4 million on parcel four

Sahtu 2000 bids

Sahtu (Central Mackenzie) August 2000 winning bids, totalling $57.4 million, include:

• Northrock Resources, Berkley Petroleum, EOG Resources, International Frontier and Pacific Rodero Ventures bid $16.6 million on parcel one
• AEC West and Renaissance Energy bid $1 million on parcel two
• Paramount Resources bid $8.4 million on parcel three
• Canadian Natural Resources bid $17.5 million on parcel four
• EOG, Berkley and Northrock bid $12.7 million on parcel five
• Anderson bid $1.2 million on parcel six
• No bids on parcel seven and eight

Inuvialuit bid

Early in 2000, Chevron Canada Resources, Petro-Canada and a unit of Anderson Resources paid the Inuvialuit Regional Corp. $75.5 million, known as a bid bonus, for exploration and drilling rights to land in the Inuvialuit settlement area. Chevron received two parcels while Petro-Canada and Anderson each received one parcel.

This was the first time the Inuvialuit offered land for resource bids. Concessions include work commitments and an option for the Inuvialuit to take a 25 per cent working interest in any discovery. Under the 1984 comprehensive land claim settlement, the Inuvialuit acquired ownership of 90,000 square kilometres, including 12,900 square kilometres of subsurface oil, gas and minerals.