Stagg Editorial- September 1995

PORT AU PORT OIL FIELDS

The Port au Port Peninsula is part of the western frontier of Newfoundland. Early in this century the industrial revolution came to the fishing settlements of Port au Port in the form of the Dosco quarry at Aguathuna. This was mining that went on for over fifty years and industrially speaking was a forerunner of the commercial outburst that came thirty years later in Stephenville when the Americans set up the massive air base we still know today as Harmon Field.

Today, after a long sabbatical from industrial prominence, the Peninsula is poised to jump back into the game with a vengeance. The wildcat oil well drilling near the new road linking Cape St. George and Mainland has made the front pages of the major business papers of this country.

The financial wizards are touting this project as possibly rivalling the Hibernia fields in size. Certainly the cost of extracting oil from the rock-solid peninsula is far less than the extraordinarily high price of Hibernia crude. It would be poetic revenge not to mention financial triumph for the citizens of this hard-rock area when Port au Port becomes the West Texas of Canada. That is "Texas" as in "Texas tea".

There are no certainties in the wildcat oil business but the interest generated in reputable financial circles shows once again that Newfoundland has a treasure trove of precious natural resources that can form the backbone of a strong provincial economy. Like Labrador's Voisey Bay, the Port au Port oil fields are precious jewels for a generation to guard fiercely. Putting these assets to work for the wealth and well-being of Newfoundland and Newfoundlanders is first and foremost in importance.

Let us be vigilant and clear-headed in our goals for such gifts that have been bestowed by nature. To do otherwise is to betray the stewardship of Newfoundland that is the obligation of each and every generation of Newfoundlanders.

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