Oil, coal drilling north of Brunner

Press, 10 November 1983, Page 23

Oil, coal drilling north of Brunner

United Resources Investments Holdings, Ltd, would drill for both coal and oil on the Aratika prospect, north of Lake Brunner, on the West Coast, next year, said a director, Mr H. D. Kennedy, yesterday. His comments come after the release of the Auckland mining investment company’s annual report, saying that the Pike River Coal Company had bought a 70 per cent interest in the Aratika coal prospect, the licence area covering a large area of coal which had been intersected by oilexploration shafts in the area. Exploration drilling has been planned for next year the report says.

Mr Kennedy said that the drilling would be used to study structure and sediments for both coal and oil.

The start of the drilling depended largely on when the seismic work in the area was done. Drilling would probably begin in June or .July. The plan was for three or four shallow holes, he said. The report shows that United Resources Investments Holdings had investments in listed securities at a market value of $3,528,298 at June 30 — more than $2,062,880 in excess of cost. The company spent $487,407 in exploration of the Pike River coal deposit in Westland. After the exploration programme, the indicated and assumed reserves at Pike

River were increased to 95 million tonnes of coal. Earlier forecasts had the reserves at about 80M tonnes of coal The test programme involved drilling of six diamond drill holes into the Brunner coal seam. All six holes intersected the seam, which ranged in thickness from 3.2 m to 1 12.06 m. The preliminary analytical work on the cores indicated a significant amount of the coal has low ash and sulphur levels. The chairman, Mr R. A. Radford, says the directors believed the Martha Hill gold and silver deposit had the potential once again to become a major producer. “We consider the investment in Mineral Resources for this alone is justified,” he said. United Resources profit for June 30 year after extraordinary items was $7147.