EnerMark Income Fund to Acquire Junior Oil Company

Western Star Exploration Limited (Western Star), which owns a number of natural gas properties in the Hanna, Taber and Thornbury areas of Alberta, announced on January 10, 2000 that in excess of 97 per cent of the issued and outstanding common shares in the company had been deposited under the November 2, 1999 pre-acquisition agreement it entered into with Enermark Income Fund (Enermark), a member of the Enerplus group of companies. Enermark instructed the depositor under the arrangement to take up and pay for the Western Star shares deposited and Enermark will proceed to acquire all the remaining common shares of Western Star pursuant to compulsory acquisition provisions. Under the agreement, Western Star shareholders had the option to take either $1.80 in cash or 0.48 of an Enermark Trust Unit and 0.75 of a warrant to purchase EnerMark Trust Units, with an exercise price of $4.00 valid until December 31, 2000.

Enermark was represented on the transaction by Brock W. Gibson, Susan Wakil, Chad Schneider and Scott Clarke from Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP and Western Star was represented by the Burnet, Duckworth & Palmer team of Daryl S. Fridhandler, Stephen J. Chetner and Gina A. Ross.