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Providing coverage of Alaska and northern Canada's oil and gas industry
May 2009

Vol. 14, No. 21 Week of May 24, 2009

Conoco files new Alpine West application

Compared to 2005 proposal, new plan for first production from NPR-A, with pad 3 miles to south, includes larger pad, more wells

Kristen Nelson

Petroleum News

ConocoPhillips Alaska has restarted permitting efforts for its CD-5 Alpine satellite development, Alpine West, which will be the first production from the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. ConocoPhillips began permitting this project with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 2005, but withdrew that application.

The corps said the current application is for a larger pad with more wells than the 2005 application: as many as 33 wells at CD-5 (compared to up to 22 wells in the 2005 application); one large and two small bridges (the 2005 application had one large and one small bridge); pad size is 11.7 acres (compared to 9.8 acres); and 6.3 miles of access road (compared to 4.4 miles).

The increase in the number of wells is based on drilling at Alpine, the main producing field in the Colville River unit, since the 2005 application, ConocoPhillips Alaska spokeswoman Natalie Lowman told Petroleum News in an e-mail.

The increase in wells to a maximum of 33 at CD-5 “came about because recent drilling information from existing Alpine pads gave us more data that positively changed our view of the resources,” Lowman said.

New pad, bridge sites

The revised site for the CD-5 Alpine satellite pad, Alpine West, will be in section 18 of township 11 north, range 4 east, Umiat Meridian, some 3 miles south of the 2005 proposed pad site in section 8, township 11 north, range 4 east, UM. The revised access road would converge with the existing road near the CD-4 pad south of the main Alpine processing facilities. Alpine is not connected to the North Slope road system, but two of its drilling pads, CD-2 and CD-4, are connected to the main CD-1 drilling and processing pad by all-weather gravel roads.

The CD-5 drill pad access road would include a 1,405-foot bridge over the Nigliq channel of the Colville River, a 317-foot bridge over a paleochannel at Lake L9341 and a 277-foot bridge over Cody Creek.

The Nigliq channel bridge has been relocated from the 2005 proposal based on consultation with Kuukpik Corp. — the village corporation at Nuiqsut and the surface owner in the area — and other stakeholders from the village of Nuiqsut to mitigate potential subsistence impacts.

The corps said the project design revisions primarily involve location and size of the CD-5 drill site, the access road and the Nigliq Channel crossing.

The new bridge location is just north of the CD-4 drill site.

ConocoPhillips told the corps the new bridge location “incorporates local knowledge provided by Kuukpik shareholders for the purposes of reducing ice jamming, providing for high and stable banks, avoiding popular subsistence fishing areas, and avoiding historic landmarks.”

Pile-supported bridges

The Nigliq channel bridge will be constructed on nine steel pile piers, with a 200-foot span over the navigation channel and the remaining piers some 174 feet apart. The corps said each pier section would include six 48-inch-diameter support steel piles and one 48-inch ice-breaking pipe. The pipeline system would be supported on the proposed bridge crossings on the downstream side, the corps said.

The bridges will carry vehicles and pipelines, but the bridge design will not support a full drilling rig, the corps said.

The bridge will have a concrete deck, as will the bridges at Lake L9341 and Cody Creek. The Lake L9341 bridge will have seven steel pile piers; the Cody Creek bridge will have four steel pile peers.

The 6.1-mile elevated pipeline system would generally parallel the access road, with 24-inch-diameter steel vertical support members some 55 feet apart. The pipelines will rest on horizontal support members 7 feet above ground elevation; 725 vertical support members will be required.

The pipeline system will include miscible injectant and seawater injection pipelines from CD-1 at Alpine, power and communications utility lines, a production pipeline to transport CD-5 produced fluids (crude oil, gas and water) to CD-1 for processing and a pipeline to transport lean gas from CD-1 to CD-5 for artificial lift.

Access for future developments

CD-5 will initiate Alpine satellite development in NPR-A, and the access road is intended to provide access for future satellite developments to the Alpine processing facility.

ConocoPhillips said foreseeable future developments include several drill sites west of the Colville River Delta which would develop small oil accumulations as satellites to the Alpine field.

Alpine West, at CD-5, would be the first Alpine satellite west of the Nigliq channel, the company said.

Successive satellites under evaluation include Lookout CD-6, CD-7 and Fiord West, but ConocoPhillips said discussions of those developments “are preliminary in nature and subject to change.”

Development of CD-6 would likely follow CD-5, the company said, followed by CD-7 and Fiord West. “Additionally, one or two unidentified drill sites may be tied into this NPR-A infrastructure if future exploration efforts in the vicinity prove successful.”

Lookout CD-6 and CD-7 are in the Greater Mooses Tooth unit in NPR-A, ConocoPhillips said, and nomenclature for those will change to GMT to distinguish developments in Greater Mooses Tooth from developments in the Colville River unit.

Sequential development

The company said sequential development and infrastructure sharing were key aspects of NPR-A development.

The value of sequential development is that each new drill site benefits from technology advancements and lessons learned, the company said. Sequential satellite development “allows for level resource loading as engineering, drilling and construction teams transition from one NPR-A project to the next,” minimizing construction support infrastructure and creating jobs and opportunities “for a sustained period of time.”

Sequential development also “maximizes use of existing facilities and minimizes the need for future Alpine field processing facility expansions, resulting in the extension of the economic life of these resources,” and increasing ultimate oil recovery, “cash flow for investors and royalty owners, and economic opportunities for local residents.”

More than 20 wells have been drilled during the eight exploration seasons since the 1999 Northeast NPR-A lease sale, but “the volume of oil discovered within the Northeast NPR-A is insufficient to economically support development of new standalone processing facilities,” ConocoPhillips said.

By sharing the Alpine pipelines, processing plant, airstrip, roads, drilling support infrastructure and operations base camp, “several of these small oil accumulations can be developed to benefit multiple stakeholders, including local residents, Alaska Native corporations, the North Slope Borough, the State of Alaska and the federal government,” the company said.

Potential projects

Lookout GMT-1, formerly CD-6, would be a pad some 8 miles southwest of Alpine West CD-5. ConocoPhillips said GMT-1 is anticipated to be the first Greater Mooses Tooth development produced through Alpine following development of Alpine West.

Plans are not final, the company said, but the base plan calls for eight wells, with an upside of 16 wells.

GMT-2, southwest of GMT-1, formerly called CD-7, is still under appraisal, the company said, but the base plan calls for 10 wells with an upside of 19 wells.

Fiord West planning is a result of appraisal wells drilled since 2004, the company said, including Iapetus and the Char No. 1, with positive results from the Char well confirming a potential satellite development about 4.5 miles north of Alpine West, an area identified in the 2004 Environmental Impact Statement as CD-12.

“This accumulation could be developed on either the east or west side of the Nigliq channel. ConocoPhillips is evaluating placing the Fiord West pad on the west side of the channel to minimize additional infrastructure in the Colville River Delta,” the company said.

While Fiord West is in the early conceptual planning stage, the company said the current plan assumes a development with 20-25 horizontal wells drilled from a gravel pad upsized to accommodate 39 wells, with an injection method of miscible water-alternating-gas.

Kuukpik spur road, lay-down area

ConocoPhillips said the Kuukpik Corp. or a Kuukpik affiliate may “construct, own and maintain” a spur road from Nuiqsut “to a mutually agreed tie-in location on the CD-5 industry road.”

The company said it has a longstanding commitment to contribute to the costs to construct such a road, which “would allow easier access for local residents to economic opportunities, such as oil industry jobs, and to subsistence hunting and fishing areas.”

The spur road would be some 5.8 miles long, but is not part of ConocoPhillips’ applications, the company said.

Another project not part of the company’s applications is a possible “lay-down” area for industry use which would be built by Kuukpik Corp. or a Kuukpik affiliate. ConocoPhillips described this as an area for storage of support equipment to the west of and outside the Colville River delta, which would reduce activities inside the delta.

First production end of 2012

Permits are required before the project will go to the ConocoPhillips board for approval, but subject to project approval, ConocoPhillips said the CD-5 development schedule would begin in the fourth quarter of 2009 with ordering of long-lead materials for the Nigliq channel bridge.

Ice road construction would begin in the fourth quarter of 2010 in support of CD-5 construction; first quarter 2011 work would include construction of the gravel road, pad, bridge piers and substructure.

There would be gravel mining and construction activities in the summer of 2011, and ice road construction would begin again in the fourth quarter of 2011 in support of construction.

First-quarter 2012 work would include installation of vertical support members, pipelines and bridge superstructure.

On-pad facilities would be constructed in the second and third quarters of 2012.

Drilling would begin in the second quarter of 2012 with first production in the fourth quarter of 2012. Drilling is expected to take 12 to 16 months.

ConocoPhillips is the operator at the Colville River and Greater Mooses Tooth units; Anadarko Petroleum is a partner in both units.






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