Media Release

For Immediate Release

July 14, 2008

OETR receives up to $19 million from Crown Share funds for geoscience research

The OETR Association (Offshore Energy Technical Research) is pleased that the Government of Nova Scotia has been able to secure significant funding for offshore energy research.

The OETR will receive $18,752,000 of the $234.4 million Crown Share settlement with Ottawa due to the province in 2007-08. The Association says the multi-million dollar grant from the province for geoscience research will significantly advance the province's research agenda. 

According to an OETR news release, the funding will go towards a number of OETR research priorities. These priorities include: the creation of a framework for geoscience analysis by potential investors, the identifying priority areas of interest, the generation of an updated estimate of hydro carbon potential for Nova Scotia offshore basins, and the development of methodologies for addressing key exploration risks including reservoir distribution and petroleum charge.

Dr. Kevin Vessey, Dean, Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research at Saint Mary's University, and the President and Director of the OETR Association, believes that this research will help entice industry to explore in Nova Scotia’s offshore. 

“This research will create a publicly available geoscience data package that will outline areas of prospectivity, as well as the geoscience explanations, evidence and theories as to why these areas are thought to be prospective,” said Dr. Vessey.

OETR has also broadened its mandate to include ocean renewable energy technology, along with petroleum exploration research and development. Interest earned on the funds endowed from the Crown Share funding will go towards the management of a number of projects to support for local wave technology research; and key technical research interest in tidal device manufacturing; and tidal electricity integration studies and modelling.

OETR is a not-for-profit corporation dedicated to fostering research to enhance petroleum exploration and development of Nova Scotia’s offshore. OETR’s members are Saint Mary’s University, Dalhousie University and Nova Scotia Energy. Funding for OETR activities and research began in March 2006 with grants that now total $21, 602,000 from Nova Scotia Department of Energy.  

For more information on the OETR Association, please visit our website at www.offshoreenergyresearch.ca. 

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For more information:

Blake Patterson
Public Affairs Officer
Saint Mary's University, Public Affairs
(902) 420.5514
E-mail: blake.patterson@smu.ca
www.smu.ca