NEWS BULLETIN

October 08, 2012 --- Vol. 18, No. 78October 2012

First drilling at NordAq’s Tiger Eye this week

Drilling is scheduled to start Oct. 9 at NordAq Energy Inc.’s Tiger Eye unit on the west side of Cook Inlet. The Alaska Department of Natural Resources, Division of Oil and Gas approved NordAq’s application for the unit Oct. 4 at 7,680 acres, a reduction from the proposed 8,480 acres, and required drilling of the first well this year. Both leases in the unit, ADL 391103 and ADL 391104, would have expired Sept. 30 without unit formation. NordAq holds 100 percent working interest ownership in the leases.

Tiger Eye is at the mouth of the Kustatan River within the Redoubt Bay Critical Habitat Area, and NordAq located its pad and access on adjacent private Native land and will drill directionally into the unit.

In the Oct. 4 unit approval division Director Bill Barron said NordAq submitted a revised plan of exploration on Aug. 20, proposing to drill two exploration wells in 2012 and 2013, and to acquire 3-D seismic in 2013. In the company’s May plan of exploration drilling was slated for 2013 and 2014, with road and pad construction in the summer of 2012 and 3-D acquisition in the winter of 2012-13.

Under the revised plan of exploration the division said NordAq planned to spud the first well, Tiger Eye Central No. 1, before the end of September, “but had delays due to severe weather in the Cook Inlet area,” and now expects to spud Oct. 9.

Under the approved plan, NordAq is required to drill, evaluate and test the Tiger Eye Central No. 1 and complete, suspend or abandon the well Dec. 31.

—Kristen Nelson

Endeavour will drill first at Cosmo

With delays in arrival of the jack-up drilling rig Endeavor — Spirit of Independence, Buccaneer Energy Ltd. said Oct. 5 that the first drilling the jack-up will do in Cook Inlet will be at the Cosmopolitan prospect.

Endeavour was scheduled to drill this year at the Southern Cross and Northwest Cook Inlet units, but those wells have been deferred to next year.

In Oct. 1 letters to Buccaneer Alaska, the Alaska Division of Oil and Gas said it found the company in default under its Southern Cross and Northwest Cook Inlet unit agreements for failure to drill at the two offshore Cook Inlet units this year. The division set conditions for the company to cure the defaults, including completing the first wells at both units by Oct. 31, 2013.

The company requested an extension on the Southern Cross well in July and on the Northwest Cook Inlet well in September.

The company’s plans of exploration had called for beginning wells at both units by Sept. 30, 2012.

Division Director Bill Barron said in the Oct. 1 letters that while the units are in default, failure to drill the wells this year will not result in unit termination, the penalty proposed by Buccaneer in its plans of exploration.

—Kristen Nelson

See stories in Oct. 14 issue, available online on Friday, Oct. 12 at 11 a.m. at www.PetroleumNews.com


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