THE quadrupling of oil prices within a few months in late 1973 and early 1974 brought to an abrupt end the era of inexpensive oil. Since then the continuing increases in the price of oil traded in the international market and the higher prices of imports of manu factured goods have seriously disrupted the foreign exchange balances of many developing countries and forced them to replan their development programmes. The impact of high oil prices is felt in every country, whether developed or developing, and has brought to world attention the fact that not only are petroleum resources in limited supply and exhaustible but also that substitutes cannot be found easily or quickly. In a world faced with the certainty of declining supplies of petroleum there is widespread interest and concern among all the oil producing countries to evaluate the extent of their petroleum resources and to examine more closely the problems of their development, rates of depletion and methods of conservation. The present work reviews some of the above issues and problems in relation to Indonesia, an OPEC member, and the major oil producing country in South-East Asia. More specifically, it seeks to provide the reader with an overview of the petroleum resources of the country their nature, extent, distribution as well as the problems of their development.

Collision between Australia and SE Asia began in the Early Miocene and reduced the former wide ocean between them to a complex passage which connects the Pacific and Indian Oceans. Today, the Indonesian Throughflow passes through this gateway and plays an important role in global thermohaline flow. The surrounding region contains the maximum global diversity for many marine and terrestrial organisms. Reconstruction of this geologically complex region is essential for understanding its role in oceanic and atmospheric circulation, climate impacts, and the origin of its biodiversity. The papers in this volume discuss the Palaeozoic to Cenozoic geological background to Australia and SE Asia collision. They provide the background for accounts of the modern Indonesian Throughflow and oceanographic changes since the Neogene, and consider aspects of the region's climate history--

The Cenozoic carbonate systems of Australasia are the product of a diverse assortment of depositional and post-depositional processes, reflecting the interplay of eustasy, tectonics (both plate and local scale), climate, and evolutionary trends that influenced their initiation and development. These systems, which comprise both land-attached and isolated platforms, were initiated in a wide variety of tectonic settings (including rift, passive margin, and arc-related) and under warm and cool-water conditions where, locally, siliciclastic input affected their development. The lithofacies, biofacies, growth morphology, diagenesis, and hydrocarbon reservoir potential of these systems are products of these varying influences. The studies reported in this volume range from syntheses of tectonic and depositional factors influencing carbonate deposition and controls on reservoir formation and petroleum system development, to local studies from the South China Sea, Indonesia, Kalimantan, Malaysia, the Marion Plateau, the Philippines, Western Australia, and New Caledonia that incorporate outcrop and subsurface data, including 3-D seismic imaging of carbonate platforms and facies, to understand the interplay of factors affecting the development of these systems under widely differing circumstances. This volume will be of importance to geoscientists interested in the variability of Cenozoic carbonate systems and the factors that controlled their formation, and to those wanting to understand the range of potential hydrocarbon reservoirs discovered in these carbonates and the events that led to favorable reservoir and trap development.