Cosmo drilling done, flow test next 11/25/2007
Pioneer Natural Resources Alaska has finished drilling a horizontal appraisal well in the 25,000-acre Cosmopolitan unit in the Cook Inlet basin. Company President Ken Sheffield told attendees of the m...

Employment booming on North Slope 11/25/2007
Employment is booming in the North Slope oil fields, according to a state labor economist. Projected employment is expected to reach 11,400 jobs this year - the highest number since oil production beg...

Administration wins on tax increase 11/25/2007
Gov. Sarah Palin gets 25% tax requested in ACES, Democrats get standard deduction; level of continuing investment the worry
An expected Nov. 16 knuckle-biter finish to the Alaska Legislature's 30-day special session never materialized. The Senate completed most of its work on the bill changing state's oil and gas producti...

Cash-strapped Fox sets sights on high-cost Alaska 11/25/2007
Alaska newcomer Fox Petroleum is a very small player in a very large oil patch inhabited by much larger, better-financed, better-equipped, and more successful exploration and production companies. Fi...

Chamber report issues energy wakeup call 11/25/2007
Business group calls for fiscal, energy strategies to meet short- and long-term needs of Alaska economy, beleaguered residents
Getting a grip on Alaska's energy outlook and developing a successful strategy to meet the needs of Alaskans now and in the future is the subject of a new 11-page report published by the Anchorage Cha...

Chevron ups stake 11/25/2007
Back on North Slope, 2007-08 AK investment doubled, might again in 2009
Chevron is back exploring on the North Slope - for the first time since the early 1990s - and will start a two-year drilling program at its White Hills exploration prospect later this year. John Zage...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Union Energy takes Kavik leases 11/18/2007
A new company won three leases in the State of Alaska's annual North Slope areawide lease sale on Oct. 24, 2007. Union Energy (Alaska) LLC, which gave the Division of Oil and Gas a contact address in...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: XTO more than doubles oil reserves 11/18/2007
XTO Energy, operator of the Middle Ground Shoal field in Alaska's Cook Inlet basin, is a good example of what an independent oil company can achieve in prolonging the life of an aging oil field. Midd...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Idaho newcomer in Cook Inlet 11/18/2007
Newcomer Duke Oil and Gas-Alaska LLC joined the bevy of small companies and investor consortiums that clamored for tracts in Alaska's Cook Inlet areawide oil and gas lease sale May 24, 2006. Its leases...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Small independents in high gear 11/18/2007
Five small EandP gas companies plan to drill exploration wells on Alaska's North Slope winter 2007-08
Five small independent oil and gas companies expect to drill exploration wells on Alaska's North Slope in the winter exploration season of 2007-08. In the past, the highest number of small independent...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Exploring on pause, development on go 11/18/2007
Pioneer focusing on Oooguruk development, Cosmo delineation; exploration still on hold due to disappointing results, concern about Alaska's tax regime
Dallas-based Pioneer Natural Resources has no immediate plans to resume its Alaska oil and gas exploration program, Timothy Dove, Pioneer's president and chief operating officer, said on Sept. 27, 200...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Taking a step back from Alaska? 11/18/2007
Rutter and Wilbanks Corp. has not been able to secure a reasonably priced drilling rig for its Ahtna 1-19 well in Alaska's undeveloped Copper River basin, Bill Rutter III told Petroleum News Oct. 31,...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Marathon continues to chase inlet gas 11/18/2007
Company sees significant opportunity in the Cook Inlet region but wants competitive gas pricing and a stable fiscal, regulatory environment in Alaska
Although oil and gas production in Alaska is declining, there are still plenty of resources to find and develop, Mitch Little, Marathon's Alaska production manager, told Petroleum News Oct. 2, 2007. "...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Benchmark Oil and Gas buying seismic, talking to operators 11/18/2007
It took more than a year, but Benchmark Oil and Gas, along with other successful bidders, finally received its lease assignments from the State of Alaska for the 20 tracts it won in the May 2006 Cook...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: ConocoPhillips drops 300,000 acres 11/18/2007
Major and its independent partners focused on appraising previously announced NPR-A discoveries
ConocoPhillips Alaska's exploration program reached into far western NPR-A last winter, 2006-07. In 2007-08 the company plans to drill closer in, with proposed exploration wells - the program had not...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Mat-Su CBM gets second chance 11/18/2007
Fowler Oil and Gas gets unanimous approval from Matanuska-Susitna Borough to drill coalbed methane well; first okayed under tough new ordinance
When Fowler Oil and Gas Corp. first came on the scene in May 2007, it had been four years since an attempt to develop coalbed methane resources in Alaska's Matanuska-Susitna Borough collapsed amid an ac...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Shell never really left Alaska 11/18/2007
2007 Beaufort drilling plans on hold due to a court order, Odom says will continue to listen, learn, work with local people
When Shell re-entered Alaska in October 2001 with the $2.4 million acquisition of 56,000 acres on the North Slope, Alaskans watched to see what the U.S. EandP arm of Royal Dutch Shell would do next. Fo...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Aurora Gas in holding pattern 11/18/2007
Drilling rig remains idle while company deals with litigation, looks to sell or recapitalize company
Following a difficult year in 2006, Aurora Gas remains in something of a holding pattern while it tries to resolve its future. Aurora Gas has spent the majority of 2007 focused on its ongoing litigati...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Chevron: working across the state 11/18/2007
White Hills exploration to begin this winter, company continues to look at Cook Inlet opportunities
Chevron, an oil and gas explorer and producer in Alaska for decades, will begin exploration drilling this winter at its White Hills prospect in the Brooks Range foothills on the southern edge of the N...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Escopeta, Renaissance hunt for jack-up 11/18/2007
Escopeta Oil has led the effort to bring a mobile offshore drilling unit into Cook Inlet, the body of water in Southcentral Alaska that lies over part of the Cook Inlet oil and gas basin. That hunt ha...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Armstrong, Total back in the game 11/18/2007
An affiliate of Denver-based Armstrong Oil and Gas and a subsidiary of Paris-based Total S.A. returned to Alaska in 2007. When independent Armstrong Alaska LLC and Houston-based major Total EandP USA In...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Paspalof to head Alaska operations 11/18/2007
Pacific Energy buys bulk of Forest Oil's Alaska assets; word is California independent buying jack-up for Cook Inlet exploration
Pacific Energy Resources Ltd. is looking to make Alaska's Cook Inlet basin a core area of its operations. The Long Beach, Calif., independent closed Aug. 27, 2007, on its purchase of Forest Oil Corp.'...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Alaska gets $2 million from lease sales 11/18/2007
An Alaska investor group and a new company dominated the State of Alaska's annual North Slope and Beaufort Sea areawide lease sales. When bids were read Oct. 24 in Anchorage by Acting Director of the...

THE EXPLORERS 2007: Welcome to The Explorers 2007 11/18/2007
Welcome to The Explorers annual magazine, which got its start as The Independents in 2002. We changed the name to The Explorers in 2004 because it was evident, as oil prices began to rise, that there...

Solving Cook Inlet's gas conundrum 11/18/2007
Region needs gas for foreseeable future; gas exploration, gas storage, North Slope gas, LNG all factor into energy supply options
The days of an overabundance of cheap natural gas from Cook Inlet basin may be over, but Southcentral Alaska needs reliable gas supplies for years to come was a recurring theme during the first day of...