* Astronomy

More oil found off the coast
Both Norwegian oil company Statoil and Norsk Hydro have struck more oil in territorial waters of the North Sea. It's not clear how much oil is involved.
Norway's oil directorate reported Monday that Statoil found the oil in a well that lies 35 kilometres east of the Gudrun field.

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Chevron Corporation announced in January another new deepwater oil discovery at the Big Foot Prospect located in Walker Ridge Block 29. The block is approximately 225 miles south of New Orleans.

Operated by a Chevron subsidiary, the Big Foot #2 discovery well is located in approximately 5,000 feet of water and was drilled to a total depth of 25,127 feet. The well encountered as much as 300 feet or more of net oil pay. Further appraisal drilling will be required to determine the commercial potential of the discovery. A sidetrack well has begun drilling.

"Big Foot is our latest success in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico and reflects our efforts to increase energy supplies to the U.S. market. This discovery should ultimately provide the country with much needed crude oil and natural gas." - Ray Wilcox, president of Chevron North American Exploration and Production Company.

"Big Foot follows our earlier success at the Knotty Head discovery and is confirmation of further potential of our exploration acreage. This discovery follows a string of Gulf of Mexico discoveries that is a result of executing our focused, high-impact exploration program." - Paul Siegele, vice president of Chevron's Gulf of Mexico Deepwater Business Unit.


Position Latitude 28.814972° longitude -89.989303°
The area is about 10,000 sq. miles in size, and was found under layers of salt dooms by a new method of oil discovery known as “gas washing” . A process in which geologist are able to track the movement of oil deposits by the way they interact with the flow of natural gas. This method helps scientists to make extremely accurate 3D-seismic maps of deep underground oil deposits and mitigate the risk involved in drilling such deep under sea wells.
The information was gathered from source rocks deep below the sea and was funded by a grant by Chevron. Efforts are now underway to rush more equipment into the area and conduct more tests, but because of the devastation left by the hurricanes Katrina and Rita there is a critical shortage of equipment and manpower to do the kind of recovery work needed to bring the oil to the surface.
Estimates range from 1 to 2 years before oil can be pumped from the find area

Chevron owns a 60 percent working interest in Big Foot. Other owners are Anadarko Petroleum Corporation with 15 percent, Plains Exploration & Production Company with 12.5 percent, and Shell with 12.5 percent.

Chevron is the largest overall leaseholder in the Gulf of Mexico and one of the world's leading energy companies. With more than 53,000 employees, Chevron subsidiaries conduct business in approximately 180 countries around the world, producing and transporting crude oil and natural gas, and refining, marketing, and distributing fuels and other energy products.

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