| Deal Description | Austral Oil Company, Inc., was to use the proceeds from this deal for working capital and general corporate purposes. The primary corporate purpose was to pay expenditures in connection with detonating a nuclear device in the Rulison Field. On March 26, 1969, the company, along with CER Geonuclear Corporation, signed a contract with the U.S. government (represented by the Atomic Energy Commission and the Department of Interior), which provided for the detonation of a 40-kiloton nuclear explosion in the Mesaverde formation of the Rulison Field. The company hoped to stimulate a natural gas reservoir in the area with the detonation. At the time, the results of using nuclear devices in the fracturing or stimulating of gas-bearing formations was highly speculative; there was no assurance that the use of nuclear energy for such purposes would result in the commercial production of gas. |
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