Danish and Greenland authorities plan to decide this spring whether to conduct future licensing off Greenland as a conventional licensing round or a less formalized negotiating procedure.
The authorities may also decide to consider applications for licenses for any area off West Greenland south of 70 30' N. Lat. without the area being formally opened for licensing. Greenland received no bids during its 1992-93 licensing round.
Meanwhile, Greenland Geological Survey said it might drill a 500 m stratigraphic well in 1994 on Svartenhuk Halvo island, close to the site where the oldest marine sediments in the area have been collected. Purpose of the well would be to push knowledge of the stratigraphy and geochemistry of these sediments as far back in time as possible.
This well would be 100-130 km north of Marraat, where the survey drilled a well in August 1993 to 447.75 m. The well was near where geologists discovered bitumen in vesicles and vugs in basalt outcrops near the base of a Paleocene lava pile.
Analyses indicated that the bitumen originated from a crude oil that had not undergone severe biodegradation. Analyses also identified oleanana, a compound that elsewhere has been reported almost exclusively in Tertiary deltaic source rocks and oils derived from them.
Copyright 1994 Oil & Gas Journal. All Rights Reserved.
