Hilcorp plans Cook Inlet airborne surveys

Kristen Nelson

Petroleum News

Hilcorp Alaska has applied to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to collect airborne gravity and magnetic data in lower Cook Inlet this May.

BOEM said it received the application Dec. 28 for a permit to conduct geophysical exploration for mineral resources on the outer continental shelf and said the permit application shows a survey area which generally overlaps the federal OCS waters of the BOEM Cook Inlet planning area in lower Cook Inlet. The agency said Hilcorp also planned to have the surveys run over the Iniskin Peninsula.

BOEM said Hilcorp planned to hire CGG Multi-Physics to acquire and process the data. Fixed-wing aircraft will be used offshore and rotor-wing aircraft onshore, with data collection expected to take two to three weeks. May 1 is the preferred start date because of typical optimum weather conditions.

Hilcorp acquired 14 lease blocks in the BOEM 2017 OCS lease sale, BOEM said, and the lower Cook Inlet geophysical program includes an aerial gravity and magnetic survey of all 14 lease blocks.

Onshore, Hilcorp already has some information: SAExploration did a 41-mile 2-D seismic shoot for the company between Chinitna Bay and Iniskin Bay in the summer of 2013. According to the application for that survey, 3.1 miles were to be on state land with local land use permits required for other areas from Tyonek Native Corp., Cook Inlet Region Inc., Salamatof Native Association Inc., Seldovia Native Corp. Inc. and Ninilchik Natives Association, Inc., as well as private permits from landowners for staging areas.

- KRISTEN NELSON