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Oil and gas heating up in Eastern Arctic
Greenland's offshore petroleum discovery spurs interest in Nunavut

Guy Quenneville
Northern News Services
Published Friday, October 29, 2010

NUNAVUT - Increased attention on the oil and gas potential of Canada's Arctic is prompting the Government of Nunavut to hold its second two-day Nunavut Petroleum Workshop in Iqaluit this week.

NNSL photo/graphic

Geologists with the Geological Survey of Canada explore Ellef Ringnes Island, where half of Nunavut's currently known 21 oil and gas discoveries are located. The work is part of the federally funded Geo-Mapping for Energy and Minerals (GEM) program aimed at gathering sorely-needed technical data to assess Nunavut's oil and gas potential. This week, the Government of Nunavut is holding a workshop on industry's potential re-entry into Nunavut in future years. - photo courtesy of Government of Nunavut

The informal gathering, which starts tomorrow, will bring together government, regulators and potentially interested industry to discuss past oil and gas finds in the territory as well as current work being done to define the oil and gas potential of largely unmapped areas.

Scottish-based Cairn Energy's confirmation that it found oil and gas this past summer at test wells in Baffin Basin – located two nautical miles from the international border with Nunavut – presents the Government of Nunavut with an opportunity to discuss whether Nunavut parcels of land in Baffin Bay should be put up for bid by Indian and Northern Affairs in the years to come, said Eric Prosh, director of minerals and petroleum for the GN.

"...there's clearly a lot of interest potentially in the Eastern Arctic because of the developments in the West Greenland offshore," said Prosh.

"We don't know completely how it's going to play out in West Greenland, but that clearly will go on," he continued. "The possibility that parts of Nunavut ... may well be of interest for future petroleum development ... is significant."

Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. and the Qikiqtani Inuit Association will also be taking part in the conference.

"There is very clearly need for potentially interested parties to come up with or just to share information about how this might or might not go forward..." said Prosh. "...that certainly includes the Inuit associations to see what their potential interests and input into the process might be.

"We have the opportunity to do this correctly if the choice is to do it."

Workshop participants will also relay information coming out of the federally-funded Geo-Mapping for Energy and Minerals (GEM) program, a five-year program partly aimed at gathering sorely-needed technical data to assess Nunavut's oil and gas potential.

This summer, the federal government spent approximately $2 million to $3 million on three Nunavut-related projects, according to Prosh.

Those projects included a remapping of Victoria Island, whose original maps date back to the 1950s, and mapping and geochemical work on Ellef Ringnes Island, where half of Nunavut's currently known 21 oil and gas discoveries are located.

"I think it's in their best business interest or business plan to open up frontier basins," said Peter Frampton, senior petroleum adviser for the Government of Nunavut, of companies such as Petro Canada-Suncor, Shell and Husky Energy, who are all slated to attend the workshop.

Nunavut's discovered fields contain estimated resources of two billion barrels of oil and 27 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, added Frampton.

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