Petroleum
Doyon now drilling Nenana well
Doyon Ltd. of Fairbanks started drilling at its latest Nenana Basin exploration well a few miles north
of the city of Nenana. Cook Inlet Region, Inc. of Anchorage is a partner with Doyon on the well. The Nabors 105 drill rig is being used on the project. The target is the Totchaket East prospect, where Doyon’s 3-D seismic has indicated the presence of possible hydrocarbon uids, either oil or gas, between 4,500 to 9,500 feet. The well is planned to be drilled to 13,000 feet. If oil is found, even a small deposit of 40 or 50 million barrels, Doyon said it believes initial development could be done by 2023 or 2025 at oil prices in the $50/barrel range. If gas is found it could be developed faster.
Doyon started drilling early to allow time for test- ing and for drilling of a “sidetrack,” or lateral second well off the vertical hole of the initial well. Drilling to possible productive zones should be complete by the end of July. Doyon plans to have the operation wrapped by the end of August.
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BLM tight with info on ANWR
The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has put a lid on information about U.S Fish and Wildlife’s criti- cism of an ANWR seismic applicatio by SA Explora- tion, a geophysical company. SA Exploration, Arctic Slope Regional Corp. and Kaktovik Inupiat Corp. (Kakovik’s village corporation) led an application to do a two-winter 3-D seismic exploration program in the “1002” coastal plain area of the Arctic Nation- al Wildlife Refuge, where the Interior Department plans lease sales under federal legislation passed
last December. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service made comments on the plan but its sister agency, the BLM, has labeled them con dential although a copy was leaked to the Washington Post. The seismic survey will include the federal 1002 area itself along with a 91,000-acre private inholding in the coastal plain owned by KIC and ASRC.
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Conoco: Anadarko buyout is done
ConocoPhillips completed its purchase of Anadarko Petroleum’s 22 percent share of western North Slope producing assets including the Alpine eld and the CD-5 drill site, along with new projects planned in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, mainly GMT-1 and GMT-2. The acquisition, for $400 million, was announced last October.
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No news on BP-Conoco “swap”
Nothing more has surfaced about a BP-ConocoPhil- lips asset exchange that would have ConocoPhillips take over some BP North Slope properties in exchange for BP acquiring some of ConocoPhillips’ North Sea holdings. BP’s major assets in Alaska are in the Prud- hoe Bay, Kuparuk River and Point Thomson elds (BP is operator at Prudhoe). Local industry-watchers say that if there’s anything to this, it likely would involve the Kuparuk holding, where ConocoPhillips is major owner and operator, and not Prudhoe or Point Thom- son with large gas reserves in both elds, as that would take BP out of the Alaska LNG game.
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Slope methanol plant hits a bump
An Alaska startup, Prudhoe Bay Chemicals, is work- ing toward construction of a small methanol plant at Prudhoe Bay to supply local needs in oil eld opera- tions. The company is headed by Alaska businessman JL Wilcox, former president of Cook Inlet Energy. Wilcox has a gas supply agreement and sales contracts with BP, we’re told, and possibly other slope produc- ers. Bristol Bay Native Corp., which owns oil service companies on the slope, is reported to be assisting in the development. One glitch is on the status of a pad that Prudhoe Bay Chemicals would use. It was former- ly owned by the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority and was transferred to the Interior Gas Utility of Fairbanks. The state Dept. of Natural Resources says a new surface land lease is needed. This could delay the methanol plant, we’re told.