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Chukchi’s Klondike, Burger of interest ConocoPhillips taking first steps towards Chukchi Sea drilling program, Shell’s 3-D coverage includes Torpedo, north of Sivulliq Alan Bailey Petroleum News
A cluster of mega-bids in the February Chukchi Sea lease sale signaled interest by Shell and ConocoPhillips in two major geologic structures about 75 miles offshore around the Klondike and Burger and wells that were drilled in 1989 and 1990. The Burger structure with a known gas field of perhaps 14 trillion cubic feet attracted a bid of $105 million from Shell.
So it wasn’t surprising to learn at the National Marine Fisheries Service’s Arctic Open Water Peer Review Meeting, held in Anchorage on April 14 to 16, that those two structures had been the focus of the pre-sale 3-D seismic programs in the summers of 2006 and 2007.
“In 2006 we collected seismic over an area that we now call Klondike and then in 2007 we did 3-D seismic acquisition on Burger,” Susan Childs, Shell’s regulatory affairs coordinator for Alaska, told the Open Water Meeting. Shell’s Michael Macrander later said that ConocoPhillips had carried out 3-D seismic surveying around the Burger structure in 2006.
And the lease sale bidding would seem to suggest that the survey results weren’t too discouraging.
Site surveys ConocoPhillips is now taking the first steps towards a potential Chukchi Sea drilling program — the company is planning a site survey program in the summer of 2008, to locate seafloor hazards such as shallow gas.
“The objective of this program is to collect data to support our permit applications, including a potential plan of exploration,” Bruce St. Pierre of ConocoPhillips told the meeting.”This is our first step … to go out and start doing some specific site activities.”
The key prospect areas for the surveys are Klondike and Burger, he said.
Some surveying will take place along routes between the prospect areas and shore, to assess features such as ice scours along potential future pipeline corridors.
ConocoPhillips has not yet funded the program or decided who will conduct the surveys, St. Pierre said.
Caryn Rea, ConocoPhillips senior staff biologist, said that the company is in the early stages of planning a Chukchi environmental studies program that will operate in parallel with the company’s other activities. The plan is to gather baseline environmental data around the Klondike prospect to feed into environmental planning and permitting, Rea said.
Rea said that ConocoPhillips wants to collaborate with other environmental programs in the area, to minimize vessel operations and seek ways of managing the huge quantities of environmental data that the companies are collecting.
Shell: top hole drilling Meantime Shell is waiting for a decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in a lawsuit over its proposed drilling in the Beaufort Sea. The company plans to use the Kulluk floating drilling platform to drill three top holes at the Sivulliq prospect on the side of Camden Bay during the 2008 open water season, after the Cross Island and Kaktovik whale hunts, Childs said.
“We’ll use two ice-class vessels and one supply vessel, so that’s four vessels including the Kulluk,” Child’s said.
The drilling will penetrate to depths of about 1,100 feet, with 20-inch casing being set in the holes.
“That is very clearly from our … 3-D seismic … very far above any liquid hydrocarbon zones,” Childs said. “So we are not planning to penetrate any liquid hydrocarbon zones in 2008 at Sivulliq.”
Shell has not yet decided where to acquire 3-D seismic data in the Chukchi Sea during 2008, she said. Seismic surveys in the Beaufort Sea are planned for Harrison Bay and Camden Bay, including coverage of a site called Torpedo, north of Sivulliq. The surveying will be done after the end of the Kaktovik and Cross Island bowhead whale hunts, Childs said.
Shell also proposes to carry out shallow hazard surveys, surveys for ice scours and an offshore geotechnical program in association with the Sivulliq prospect, Childs said.
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