Sales set for North Slope, Beaufort Sea

The Alaska Division of Oil and Gas has issued sale notices for the North Slope areawide 2006A and Beaufort Sea areawide 2006A competitive oil and gas lease sales.

Bid opening for the sales will begin at 8:30 a.m. Oct. 25 at the Wilda Marston Theater, Loussac Public Library in Anchorage. Bidding information is available on the division’s Web site: www.dog.dnr.state.ak.us. Copies of regional tract maps are available for $25 per set at the division’s office in Anchorage.

The division said the commissioner of Natural Resources has issued a decision of no substantial new information for both sales.

Beaufort Sea tracts 27 through 39, east of Kaktovik, and tracts 555 and 557 through 573, between Tangent Point and Point Barrow, are deferred from this lease sale.

For both sales there is a minimum cash bonus bid of $10 per acre on all tracts. In the North Slope sale the royalty rate for tracts north of the North Slope royalty line will be 16.6667 percent, and 12.5 percent below the line. Tracts north of the royalty line have a term of five years; tracts south of the royalty line have a term of seven years. For the Beaufort Sea sale tracts 1 through 26 have a fixed royalty rate of 12.5 percent; all other tracts have a fixed royalty rate of 16.6667 percent. The term for tracts 1 through 26 is 10 years; for tracts 40 through 77, 500 through 554 and 556, the term is seven years; and for all other tracts the term is five years.

—Petroleum News