Gov. Frank Murkowski told members of the Alaska Support Industry Alliance Sept. 23 that preliminary results of a state study indicate off-road tundra travel on Alaska’s North Slope could be opened in mid-December, three to four weeks earlier than normal.
Speaking at the association’s annual meeting in Anchorage, the governor said the action would effectively lengthen the three-month North Slope exploration season.
Begun last fall, the study was conducted by the Alaska Department of Natural Resources’ Division of Land, Mining and Water. According to Harry Bader, the division’s northern region land manager, the results will provide the agency with a much better scientific basis for its tundra opening decisions. (See related story in the Aug. 15 edition of Petroleum News.)
The division’s mission from the governor, he said, was to extend the on-tundra work season while maintaining — or exceeding — the current level of tundra protection.
“The results are not in. Our final conclusions will be finished in mid-November, but a preliminary review of the data is very encouraging,” division Director Bob Loeffler told Petroleum News in an interview following the governor’s announcement.
The governor released the information early to accommodate companies that are seeking board approval for their winter exploration projects in Alaska.
“It’s important to give the companies a heads-up,” so North Slope exploration projects can be approved in time for the winter exploration season, he said.
“If it’s a typical winter, we can expect to open the coastal areas to tundra travel by mid-December, which is three weeks to a month ahead of the typical openings of the last three years,” Loeffler said.
“Lengthening the three-month exploration season by a few weeks or a month is a very important change” to oil companies exploring on the North Slope, which has no oil field roads outside the developed areas of the central North Slope. “The extra weeks could allow the companies to complete exploration in one season that would normally be spread to two seasons,” he said, calling the preliminary study results an “important win for the companies, for the Alliance companies and for Alaska.
“Let’s pray for cold weather on the North Slope,” Loeffler said.
Earlier successes
This increase in the exploration season is not the first by the state in recent years, especially under the Murkowski administration, Loeffler said, pointing to DNR’s willingness to permit pre-packing, a method by which ice road construction can be started ahead of the normal season.
“We have become much more aggressive about promoting a longer winter exploration season,” he said. “We permit pre-packing on a project specific basis. The Alpine expansion is an example. As soon as possible we’ll give ConocoPhillips the authority to pre-pack … which is basically a three-step process.”
The first step begins with Catco rolligons, which are permitted to work on the tundra from July 15 to break-up in May because of their low-impact on the tundra.
The rolligons roll over the snow to pack it down, “destroying the insulating properties of the snow, inducing freezing,” Bill Kuper told Petroleum News. Kuper, based in Anchorage, is general manager for Catco in Alaska.
“They wait for cold weather to drive frost into the ground, which can take a few weeks,” and which is step two, Loeffler said. “If it snows, they do it again.”
Step three is sidecasting, which Kuper said is building the base coat of an ice road.
“They take a rolligon and sidecast water to eliminate air pockets and saturate the snow; and sometimes they take a front-end loader and roll it back and forth and to pack down the snow to make sure there are no air pockets,” Loeffler said.
“And then they take a small water truck to start building the ice road. Once they have a small ice road with some strength they can take the larger trucks and build it faster,” he said.
“The end result is you can get those people out on the tundra earlier without compromising the environment,” Loeffler said.
Kuper agreed. Using pre-packing last year to its drilling location in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, “Total was able to get out there way before the off-road tundra travel season opened.”
