If you haven't heard of the Beetaloo Basin yet, chances are you will in the coming months and years.
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The Beetaloo is a geological region in the Northern Territory, around 500 kilometres south-east of Darwin, and sits in the Sturt Plateau region, between Mataranka to the north and Elliott to the south.
It's the subject of intense interest due to its gas reserves, around 6.6 trillion cubic feet, according to industry predictions.
Around 70 per cent of the Territory's prospective shale gas resources are estimated to live in the Beetaloo Sub-basin, and according to the NT fracking inquiry, recent shale gas discoveries in the region could increase Australia's global ranking of gas resources from seventh to sixth.
The Basin is considered so promising that it has raked in around half of the total $505 million of exploration investment in the NT since 2010.
According to the Katherine Times, two big energy companies, Santos and Origin Energy, are both spending up in their rush to "prove" the gas resource deep below the Beetaloo, trucking in drill gear from all parts of Australia as the companies rush to beat the wet season.
Junior player Empire Energy has also joined the race and is keen to finish its seismic surveys of the Beetaloo before starting its drilling program after the wet.
This is all quite an economic boost for the Territory but if they do "prove" the resource, it gets interesting for Mount Isa and Queensland too.
Last year Jemena opened the Northern Gas Pipeline from Tennant Creek to Mount Isa which links NT's Amadeus Gas Pipeline to Queensland's Carpentaria Gas Pipeline.
Now Jemena are working on another pipeline from the Galilee Basin near Longreach to the Wallumbilla gas hub near Roma.
And if the Beetaloo delivers, it will "close the loop" and building the link between Longreach and Mount Isa.
All this is good news for gas consumers on the coast who are paying a premium since Australian gas reached parity with higher world prices due to the new LNG export terminals at Gladstone.
It will also be good news for our local economy and the longer-term "pipeline of work", both literally and metaphorically.
Derek Barry
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
