While the terrorist targeted Indonesia's tourist industry, according to one Indonesia official, that country's energy assets could also be potential targets.
The oil and gas industry is the biggest earner of foreign exchange for this fragile nation's economy and for the uninitiated, Indonesia is the world's largest exporter of LNG.
Staying in Indonesia, struggling Matrix Oil has finally put itself in receivership blaming recent events for its inability to raise funds to repair its Langsa oilfield. It has also launched legal proceedings against the company leasing the FPSO.
In the markets, AGL has finally become a modern corporate entity and predicted better times ahead for its proprietors (now shareholders) after a lean couple of years. It also took time out at its annual meeting to give energy market regulations a tongue lashing.
Woodside's share price slumped during the week after investors baulked at the idea of having their stock diluted by a billion dollar equity issue to fund overseas acquisitions. Not helping Woodside's cause were softening oil prices and industrial relations strife at its NWS gas site.
Junior explorers Mosaic Oil and Longreach Oil are both in the market looking to raise cash to fund drilling operations. Also in the market looking to raise cash is controversial shale oil producer, Southern Pacific Petroleum, which is participating in its first non-renounceable rights issue in 24 years.
In the field, the big news this week was the big oil find by Woodside and its partners off the coast of the West African nation of Mauritania. Partners are confident that Mauritania will become a major deepwater petroleum province.
Closer to home, the Harriet JV recorded another successful gas strike with Endymion-1(TL/1), making it eight strikes from 10 wells drilled during the year.
Also happy were partners in the Woodada-19 well (onshore Perth Basin). Despite all the delays and cost overruns, Bounty Oil & Gas and Hardman Resources said the well recorded strong commercial gas flows. However, the partners were not so successful in quantifying the presence of a deeper oil structure.
Not so happy this week was Santos and partners in Bligh-1 (Carnarvon Basin), which turned out to be a duster.
Empire Oil & Gas has decided push back the spud date for Eclipse-1 (onshore Perth Basin), to late December or early new year.
On the other side of the country, Sydney Gas's dream of becoming a major gas supplier is one step closer to reality after being granted NSW's second only petroleum production lease. The first PPL also belongs to Sydney Gas.
While Australia's Treasury Department has sounded a cautionary note over the benefits of renewable energy, the sector just keeps grabbing the headlines.
This week a US technology company said it is developing refining technology that could help ease Australia's impending oil shortfall by converting natural gas to clean transport fuel at source. The company is currently looking for potential investors from the ranks of Australia's oil and gas companies.
Work on a wind farm in the WA southwest town of Esperance is set to begin within a week. Upon completion, the facility will mean more than 20% of Esperance's energy will come from clean wind energy.
In NSW, a $70 million waste-to-energy facility has been given the go-ahead, which will produce around 17,000 MW hours of electricity as well cut greenhouse emissions by 300,00 tonnes a year.
Overseas, apart from the appalling news emanating from Bali, EnergyReview.net (our internet sister publication) broke a world exclusive and a Saudi media ban over a catastrophic rig collapse in that country, which has left people dead, wellheads leaking and operator Saudi Aramco at a loss as to what to do.
Hoping for a better result is Sydney-based Novus Petroleum who is looking to expand its presence in the US with the help of a Louisiana-based private outfit made up of former Petsec executives.
In Asia, Carnarvon Petroleum succeeded in extending its Thai oil field further north after its third and final well in second phase drilling hit hydrocarbons.
Indonesia's state-owned Pertamina said it was confident of extending several Asian contracts that are due to expire over the next few years.
Not so confident are the Chinese leaders charged with overhauling that nation's electricity industry after investigations revealed widespread corruption or "economic crimes" as the communists so delightfully put it.
The former boss of the State Power Corporation, China's biggest power producer, is reported to have fled the country while the political future of China's second most powerful individual, Li Peng, does not look so rosy after reports he turned the electricity industry into his own private fiefdom.
And to close on a public service announcement, the Western Australian Basins Symposium and Deal Day will start this Sunday at Burswood. Required attendance by the movers and shakers of the exploration world - see http://www.pesansw.com for details.
