Mining News: Junior jumps in with both feet at Ambler 01/17/2010
NovaGold agrees to buy Arctic VMS project for US$29 million; opts to focus on environmental studies, Northwest community in 2010
NovaGold Resources Inc. has cut a deal with Rio Tinto subsidiary Kennecott Exploration Co. to purchase 100 percent interest in the precious-metal-rich Ambler copper-zinc property in Northwest Alaska....

Mining News: New year, decade brings opportunities 01/17/2010
Alaska mining industry will continue to supply world's demands for mineral resources, despite ups and downs in global markets
As we plunge headlong into a new year and a new decade, the broad economic indicators for the mining industry suggest continued strong prices for most commodities in 2010 followed by slightly lower av...

Swenson named in-state gas line manager 01/03/2010
Alaska Gov. Sean Parnell has named Bob Swenson of Fairbanks to replace Harry Noah as the state's in-state gas line project manager. Noah announced his resignation earlier this year, citing the demands...

Power from the North Slope by HVDC? 12/20/2009
State-of-the-art high-voltage direct current, or HVDC, technology is changing the rule book for long-distance power transmission, thus perhaps making feasible the export of large-scale power supplies...

DNR opens travel in western coastal area 12/20/2009
On Dec. 17 the Alaska Department of Natural Resources opened the western coastal area of state land on the North Slope for off-road tundra travel, for vehicles with off-road travel permits. Conditions...

Exploration credits holding steady 12/20/2009
Proposed FY 2011 budget has $180M for tax credits, funds in-state and out-of-state gas, variety of other resource-related projects
The $10.5 billion budget proposed by Alaska Gov. Sean Parnell on Dec. 14 continues to fund many resource development projects started under the Palin administration, and creates several new projects,...

State lands still closed for tundra travel 12/13/2009
The Dec. 4 Alaska Department of Natural Resources report on the status of off-road travel restrictions on state lands in northern Alaska indicated that all areas remained closed at that time. In coast...

Parnell budgets Umiat road permitting 12/13/2009
Proposes $8 million line item in FY 2011 budget for permitting an all-season road; claims lack of infrastructure holding up development
Alaska Gov. Sean Parnell is planning to include $8 million in his fiscal year 2011 budget for the Department of Transportation and Public Facilities to permit a road to Umiat. A road to Umiat, a stag...

TG World positive on NS exploration 12/06/2009
BRPC JV partner spells out some details of seismic and drilling program across the North Slope; sees value of exploration credits
As the only outfit engaged in exploration onshore or offshore northern Alaska this winter, Brooks Range Petroleum Corp., operator for a joint venture of small independents, looks like having a lonely...

Projecting the jobs 11/29/2009
AEDC CEO Bill Popp works with Petroleum News and Mining News on new project forecast
Like one of Scrooge's Christmas apparitions, a ghost of Alaska's future could portend doom, or could just prove to be a warning of the consequences of not taking appropriate action. And from the persp...

No foothills drilling for Anadarko 11/22/2009
Anadarko Petroleum spokesman Mark Hanley confirmed Nov. 17 that his company will not drill in the Brooks Range foothills during the coming winter exploration season. "We're probably not going to have...

Noah resigns from in-state gas line job 11/22/2009
Harry Noah has resigned as in-state gas line project manager, the governor's office said Nov. 18. In a statement Gov. Sean Parnell said he has accepted Noah's resignation. Noah will stay in the post...

Oil Patch Insider: A Boone worth Pickin'? Shell denies asking for decision delay; Enstar still upbeat on bullet line 11/22/2009
Canadian investors are being given a chance to find out just how shrewd T. Boone Pickens is in reading future trends in the energy industry. The one-time corporate raider and promoter of an energy pla...

The Explorers 2009: 11/15/2009
Renaissance hopes to benefit from wells drilled by the U.S. Navy more than 60 years ago. The Texas-based independent, which operates in Alaska both as Renaissance Alaska and Renaissance Cook Inlet, is...

The Explorers 2009: Brooks Range Petroleum Corp. 11/15/2009
Brooks Range Petroleum Corp. is the operating arm of the Kansas-based Alaska Venture Capital Group and the lead company in a multipartner venture responsible for some of the most active drilling on th...

The Explorers 2009: Anadarko Petroleum 11/15/2009
While most independents come to Alaska looking for smaller fields passed over by the majors, Anadarko Petroleum arrived in the early 1990s looking for big "anchors." The Texas company formed partnersh...

The Explorers 2009: Northern Alaska and Arctic offshore 11/15/2009
In 1968 the discovery of the giant Prudhoe Bay field, the first field to be discovered on Alaska's North Slope and among the 20 largest oil fields ever discovered worldwide, triggered a northern Alask...

Surface permafrost may vanish in Alaska 11/15/2009
Alaska probably will see most of its surface permafrost vanish by the end of this century, but researchers believe vast areas of frozen soil will remain deeper underground even as air temperatures inc...

Tundra travel closed on state NS lands 11/15/2009
On Nov. 6 the Alaska Department of Natural Resources issued its first off-road tundra travel status report for the winter of 2009-10. All areas of state-owned land on the North Slope and in the Brooks...

Mining News: Trial run at Chandalar ruled success 10/25/2009
Goldrich runs three-week test with gravity recovery circuit of own design; aims for bigger equipment, larger settling pond in 2010
Goldrich Mining Co. completed a brief pilot program during the final weeks of the short Arctic placer mining season at Little Squaw Creek on the miner's 14,993-acre Chandalar property located in the f...

Wanted: Operator for Cook Inlet fields 10/11/2009
The State of Alaska is looking for a contractor to come up with a longer-term solution for the Cook Inlet basin assets abandoned in bankruptcy proceedings by operator Pacific Energy Resources. Among t...

Railbelt crossroads 10/11/2009
Gas-dependent SC Alaska tries to determine how to meet energy needs
As the Municipality of Anchorage prepares for the possibility of natural gas shortages during the cold of the coming winter, shortages that would cause the electric utilities to activate contingency p...

TG, BRPC reach settlement 10/04/2009
Plan to drill 1-2 exploration wells at North Slope Beechey Point unit this winter
Winter exploration by BRPC is moving ahead after legal difficulties between partners in the North Slope Beechey Point unit were resolved in late September. TG World, AVCG and Brooks Range Petroleum C...

Mining News: Minerals gain momentum as season wanes 09/27/2009
Average rate of gold investment around the world nearly doubles in past eight years as demand for metals increases exponentially
Although Alaska's summer field season is quickly coming to an end, the mineral industry continues to gain momentum thanks to rapidly increasing metals prices, fueled in part by growing industrial dema...

Fate of Petro-Can Alaska acreage unknown; Suncor divesting some natural gas 09/20/2009
Suncor Energy is planning to divest a chunk of its natural gas assets by the end of 2010, news that might not bode well for Alaska. "We will go through a significant downsizing of those assets," John...