The most expensive parcel of land from the January 24, 2024 Alberta Crown land sale was not for Montney or Duvernay development, but was actually for Mannville / Clearwater potential. This 8 section block pictured below went for almost $4.2 MM, and was the second most richly priced on a price per section basis in the Jan 24 land sale at $523k/section. The zone listed is officially “oil sands in the Mannville group”.
What’s interesting about this piece of land is that there are no spuds over the last 5 years in this township, or in any of the 8 adjacent townships either, meaning this area is largely untested. Spur Petroleum drilled a few Mannville multi-laterals in township 058-14W4 but those were mostly at least 7 years ago and longer.
Figure 1 – Jan 24 Crown land sale results
If we go back over the last year, we can see a number of other sections sold at Crown land sales in the area. Almost all of these other sections are also held by land broker, one exception being 4 sections in township 060-13W4 that were sold to Rubellite Energy.
Figure 2 – Crown land sale results last 1 year
We don’t yet know which company or companies have been acquiring these broker-held mineral rights in the area, but clearly somebody thinks there could be interesting potential here. Subscribe to BOE Intel to gain a leg up on figuring out the ins and outs of transactions like these, and spot asset transfers or licences on broker-held land to figure out mineral rights ownership.