Petroleum Exploration and Production in Europe in 1969

Abstract

In 1969 oil production in western Europe continued at about 383,000 b/d, due to lack of important recent oil discoveries. Gas production increased 39.2% to more than 5.77 Bcf/d because of increased outlets for gas from the Groningen field of The Netherlands, the British North Sea fields, and northwest German fields. The North Sea continued to be the most active exploration area. There were several unevaluated potentially important discoveries, including an oil discovery in the Norwegian sector near the median line of the sea, a gas discovery in the Triassic in Dutch waters, and a Triassic gas find in the deep, central part of the English basin. The offshore boundaries of Germany, The Netherlands, and Denmark remained unsettled except for short nearshore segments. There we e 6 discoveries of gas and 1 of oil in Austria. Exploratory drilling was unsuccessful in France, though a deep wildcat in the Aquitaine basin had favorable gas shows but was junked. Wells were drilled on the outer continental shelves of the Bay of Biscay and the Mediterranean Sea. In Germany exploratory drilling increased, and an oil discovery was made in the Lower Saxony basin and 3 gas discoveries in northwest Germany and 1 in the Alpine foreland. Italy awarded extensive new offshore exploration permits, and there was increased exploratory drilling in the Adriatic Sea. In The Netherlands there were 3 gas discoveries in the northeast. Attempts to extend gas fields in central Friesland Province were unsuccessful. Exploration in Spain declined, but for the first time large exploration blo ks were granted off northwestern Spain in the Bay of Biscay. There was an apparently significant oil discovery in the Drava basin of Yugoslavia. Offshore exploration blocks were granted between Scotland and the Outer Hebrides, and off the coasts of Ireland. Portugal invited bids for offshore rights. In the Soviet Union production of oil rose to 6,300,000 b/d and of gas to 17.7 Bcf/d. The Northern Lights pipeline was completed from the Vuktyl' gas field of the Timan-Pechora basin to between Moscow and Leningrad, providing the first access of Arctic gas to major markets. There was a sharp increase in oil production from the oil fields of the middle Ob valley in western Siberia, and the largest of these fields, Samotlor, went on production to the main pipeline system. The waxy crude of th Mangyshlak Peninsula was connected by pipeline with a refinery at the north end of the Caspian Sea. Significant gas discoveries were made in the West Siberian basin, Central Asia, north of the Caucasus, the eastern Ukraine, and in far northeastern Siberia. Important oil discoveries were in the West Siberian basin, north and east of the Caspian Sea, in the eastern Ukraine, and in Byelorussia. Oil production continued to decline in Romania, Hungary, Poland, and Bulgaria, but gas production increased.