Nevtah/Black Sands Energy Acquire Significant Sunnyside Lease in Utah Tar/Oil Sands

Nevtah/Black Sands Energy Acquire Significant Sunnyside Lease in Utah Tar/Oil Sands

Nevtah Capital Management and its joint venture partner, Black Sands Energy, have signed an agreement to acquire a key leasehold property within the richest portion of the Sunnyside Deposit in the Utah Oil Sands.

The Sunnyside Deposit, according to the Lewin & Associates Report, 1983, ranges in field richness from 100,000 to 600,000 bbl/acre. The Report’s assessments were based on actual well-log and core data, supplemented by geological interpretation, and previously published studies. Nevtah/Black Sands’ recently-acquired, privately-held lease consists of 5500 acres and is located in the richest portion of this deposit. The joint venture partners will now commission an independent consulting firm to provide a comprehensive reserve analysis, together with levels of measured, indicated and inferred resources. A substantial volume of core data on this lease is available for analysis. The Sunnyside Deposit contains substantially richer pay zones than the Asphalt Ridge and PR Spring Deposits nearby. A report commissioned by the U.S. Department of the Interior-Bureau of Mines (March, 1976) by the Eyring Research Institute rated the Sunnyside Deposit as “the deposit most favorable for large scale surface mining. The principal reason for this rating is the thick pay zones.”

The Sunnyside Deposit in the Utah Oil Sands is the second largest of the major oil sands deposits with reserves of 6.0 billion bbl. (As compared with Tar Sand Triangle (16.0 billion bbl), Asphalt Ridge (1.5 billion bbl) and PR Spring (4.5 billion bbl)). It is situated on the southwest flank of the Uinta Basin, about 18 miles east of the town of Price, Utah. The deposit is exposed along the western side of the Roan Cliffs, from Rock Creek on the south to Nine Mile Creek on the north. Elevations of bitumen-saturated outcrops range from about 8,900 feet to 9,700 feet. Topography is characterized by high-relief and rugged terrain. The Sunnyside Deposit covers an area of 122 square miles. Land ownership is mostly private with some federal and state land.

The Sunnyside Deposit contains bitumen -saturated units occurring within both the Green River and Colton Formations (Shenk & Pollastro, 1987). The Green River Formation consists of shale, marlstone, siltstone, sandstone, limestone and tuff. Beds of shale, siltstone compose the Colton Formation. Two zones of saturation have been identified in the subsurface. The upper zone crops out in several drainages and may have a gross thickness of up to 1,000 feet. The lower zone, 800 – 900 feet below the upper zone, is between 1,300 and 1,900 feet. The U.S. Geological Survey estimated that the Sunnyside bituminous-sandstone-resource consisted of about 1.6 billion cubic yards of material. Of this, they estimated that 0.9 billion cubic yards included measured plus indicated resources, with 0.7 billion cubic yards as inferred resources. The U.S. Bureau of Mines translated this estimate into 720 million bbl of oil equivalent, of which 409.5 million bbl included measured plus indicated resources, and 318.5 million bbl were inferred resources. Ritzma (1979), using additional data, classified the deposit as “giant” and estimated that between 3.5 and 4.0 billion bbl oil were contained in-place. Of this estimate, he classified 1.25 billion as measured, 1.75 billion as indicated, and the remaining 0.5 to 1 billion as inferred.

The Sunnyside Deposit has a rich history of major oil company exploration activities over the past forty years. In 1963-64, Shell Oil collected cores from numerous boreholes as part of an evaluation program that eventually led to an experimental in-situ steamflood in 1966. Shell continued evaluation of the deposit and drilled additional core holes in 1967. (Thurber & Welbourn, 1977) Signal Oil & Gas, in 1967, attempted an in-situ steam process using horizontal holes to recover oil. Pan-American Petroleum Corporation also performed an in-situ steamflood in 1966. Texaco and Gulf later conducted coring operations within the deposit. During 1982, Enercor performed preliminary mining feasibility studies on their acquired leases. Phillips Petroleum, Sabine Resources, Cities Service and Amoco all considered development of the oil/tar sand resources at Sunnyside. Chevron Resource Company signed an operating agreement with Great National Corporation (GNC) for the development of 2,000 acres of the Sunnyside Deposit in 1982. GNC had been involved in development of this deposit since the late 1970s and had also proposed to build a pilot plant. Under the Chevron/GNC agreement, bitumen-saturated material was mined and test-processed at Chevron’s pilot plant located next to Chevron’s refinery north of Salt Lake City. (Covington & Young, 1985)

Despite considerable efforts and expenditures over this forty year period by more than ten major oil and gas companies, the oil sands remained a virtually untouched resource due to the lack of an economically viable, commercial technology. Coupled with this failure and the sagging prices of oil into the 1990s, the Utah Oil Sands have remained “America’s Forgotten Resource.” The joint venture partners realize the vast potential of this extremely large oil sand lease, which will become the flagship lease for the their proven, closed-loop extraction system that will produce oil for less than $ 12.50 USD per barrel delivered to the refineries in nearby Salt Lake City. The system is earth-friendly, has near-zero solvent loss, produces minimal greenhouse gases and returns the cleaned-up sands back to the environment, leaving the ecosystem in better-than-original condition. This highly-scalable technology does not require water and works efficiently on a wide range of host oil and sediment types.

The joint venture partners are currently negotiating several additional lease opportunities in the Utah Oil Sand area. The recently completed 500 bbl/day production unit is currently being successfully demonstrated in Oklahoma to several groups of large and small oil companies, potential joint venture partners and lease owners.

For more information on the partnerships’ closed-loop technology, please visit the corporate website: www.nevtahoilsands.com or call Paul Davey, Investor Services (778) 389-0915 (Canada), (Email: paul@nevtahoilsands.com) or Daniel P. Kesonen, President & CEO, Nevtah Capital Management Corp. (561) 626-9901.

Nevtah Capital Management adheres to the provisions, regulations and specifications of the Safe Harbor Act.

For more information:
www.nevtahoilsands.com

Paul Davey Investor Services (778) 389-0915 (Canada)

Email: paul@nevtahoilsands.com

Daniel P. Kesonen President & CEO Nevtah Capital Management Corp.

(561) 626-9901

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