oil and gas recovery for the OCS area between New York and North Carolina as 

 6 billion barrels of oil and 32 trillion cubic feet of gas (of which 6 

 trillion cubic feet would be recovered in association with crude oil )(12,p.ll ) 



Comparison of potential recoverable oil and gas resources for the Mid 

 and South Atlantic OCS with those of currently producing OCS regions is im- 

 portant in establishing the level of activity which may occur in the study 

 area. For example, the past cumulative production of oil and gas (through 

 December, 1974) for the Western Gulf of Mexico OCS is 6 billion barrels of 

 oil and 67 trillion cubic feet of gas. For the Southern California OCS, 

 production figures are 3 billion barrels of oil and 2 trillion cubic feet of 

 gas (7, p. 32). The estimated undiscovered recoverable oil and gas resources 

 for the entire United States, onshore and offshore, are 36 to 81 billion 

 barrels of crude oil and 286 to 529 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. 



Potential yields of the first lease sale (No. 40) in the Baltimore 



Canyon Trough are described by the BLM (l,p.3) as: 



The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) estimated in September, 1975, 

 based on proprietary geophysical data, that the undiscovered 

 recoverable resources of the 154 tracts included in the proposed 

 lease sale area range from 0.4 to 1.4 billion barrels of oil and 

 2.6 to 9.4 trillion cubic feet of gas. 



Based on the Geological Survey's estimates of the potential 

 undiscovered resources of the 154 tracts (876,750 acres) pro- 

 posed for sale, the peak production could range from 90 to 

 320 thousand barrels of oil per day and from 0.85 to 3 billion 

 cubic feet of gas per day, peaking approximately 10 years after 

 production has commenced. 



4.2 EXPLORATION ACTIVITIES 



Geophysical survey activities have been carried out in each of the 



three major Atlantic OCS regions (Georges Bank, Baltimore Canyon, and 



Southeast Georgia Embayment), although most operations have concentrated 



17 



