III. PCS DEVELOPMENT AND FUTURE POTENTIAL 

 POTENTIAL 



The BLM Draft Final Environmental Statement on Sale 35 originally 

 indicated potential oil resources in the candidate tracts to be between 

 1.6 and 2.7 billion barrels of oil. Elimination of Santa Monica Bay 

 tracts as candidates reduced this estimate to 1.3 to 2.3 billion 

 barrels. The Western Gas and Oil Association at one time estimated 

 that the entire area covered by Sale 35 contained 6 to 19 billion 

 barrels of undiscovered oil. However, this figure included tracts 

 that were not subject to leasing at that time, although they could be 

 offered by order of the Secretary at a later date (See Table 2). 



The OCS Task Force has recalculated the estimates of reserves and 

 potential production from the Santa Barbara Channel and the tracts 

 leased in Sale 35 (See Tables 3-5). The American Association of 

 Petroleum Geologists estimated the proven reserves for the entire 

 California coastal region to be 637,615,000 barrels of oil, and 

 743,166 MMcfdof natural gas.^ 



Ten OCS oil fields and one gas field are known to exist off 

 Southern California. One additional field, Carpinteria, crosses the 

 State-Federal boundary. The Dos Cuadras and Carpinteria offshore 

 fields are now in production and Exxon is constructing a production 

 platform on the Hondo offshore field in the Santa Ynez Unit. All 

 known OCS fields are in the Santa Barbara Channel. Estimates of 

 undiscovered reserves are to be considered "best guesses" based on 



geological and geophysical exploration, and will undoubtedly change 



4 

 as exploratory drilling continues. 



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