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Underexplored but not forgotten. Assessing the energy resources potential of the greater Pedirka Basin region through play based mapping

Created 19/11/2025

Updated 19/11/2025

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The Pedirka, Simpson and western Eromanga basins in central Australia have undergone a chequered exploration history which has seen a total of only 42 wells drilled across a study area of ~210,000km2. Exploration initially focused on conventional hydrocarbons from the 1950s-1980s, before shifting towards coal seam gas (CSG) opportunities in the mid-2000s. Active petroleum systems have been proven in the region by a non-commercial oil discovery at Poolowanna 1 in 1977, and by several wells that showed evidence of residual oil columns. CSG exploration wells have confirmed the presence of thick, marginally mature coal intervals on the flanks of the basins, but are yet to evaluate the deeper troughs. Geoscience Australia, the Northern Territory Geological Survey and the South Australian Department for Energy and Mining have been collaborating on the Australia’s Future Energy Resources project under the Australian government funded Exploring for the Future Program to undertake an assessment of the resource potential for conventional and unconventional hydrocarbons, and the geological carbon and storage (GCS) potential of the greater Pedirka region. The project applied a play-based exploration approach to qualitatively assess the resource potential of the region. The Carboniferous to Cretaceous stratigraphic interval was divided into 14 plays which were evaluated for the presence of sediment-hosted energy resources through post-drill analysis, gross depositional environment mapping and common risk segment mapping. The analysis identified energy resources and GCS potential across multiple plays and locations within the study area. These results demonstrate, that while the region is underexplored, it should not be overlooked by future exploration activities.

Published in The APPEA Journal 2023. Citation: Iwanec Jeremy, Strong Paul, Bernecker Tom (2023) Underexplored but not forgotten: assessing the energy resources potential of the greater Pedirka Basin region through play-based mapping. The APPEA Journal 63, S251-S256. https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ22150

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Field Value
Title Underexplored but not forgotten. Assessing the energy resources potential of the greater Pedirka Basin region through play based mapping
Language eng
Licence Not Specified
Landing Page https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/d5c159e2-5fac-468d-b9d7-ee50c830fcb6
Contact Point
Geoscience Australia Data
clientservices@ga.gov.au
Reference Period 30/06/2025
Geospatial Coverage
Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors
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  "type": "Polygon"
}
Data Portal Geoscience Australia

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This dataset was originally found on Geoscience Australia "Underexplored but not forgotten. Assessing the energy resources potential of the greater Pedirka Basin region through play based mapping". Please visit the source to access the original metadata of the dataset:
https://ecat.ga.gov.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/csw/dataset/underexplored-but-not-forgotten-assessing-the-energy-resources-potential-of-the-greater-pedirka1