RAG started crude oil exploration in 1935 after obtaining the first exploration rights in the Vienna Basin. Oil has been produced from Miocene and Pliocene sands and sandstones since 1937. RAG still holds production licenses in three old oil fields in the Vienna Basin.
RAG has evaluated the geology and the hydrocarbon potential of the Molasse Zone in Salzburg and Upper Austria since the late 1940‘s and, more recently, in Bavaria. The Molasse Zone largely corresponds to the North Alpine Foreland Basin extending from Switzerland in the West, through Germany and Austria into the Czech Republic in the East. The basin was filled by clastic sediments due to uplift and erosion of the Alpine Orogen.
In petroleum geology, the main activities of geoscientists are exploration, development and optimum production of oil and gas fields in collaboration with various other disciplines. Four major fields of activity can be distinguished