Kerr-McGee Oil & Gas Corp. has filed an operation plan with the state of Alaska to drill up to six exploration wells this winter offshore the Milne Point unit, three miles north of Oliktok Point, from two to three locations, using two, and possibly three, drilling rigs. 
Operations Manager Todd Durkee told Petroleum News July 14 that the company included all of the options — from a single well to six wells — in its operations plan. He said the company has not committed to any rig yet. 
Kerr-McGee told the state the operations will be “nearly identical” to those in the same area last winter, with access by sea ice roads from Oliktok Point to ice pads on and adjacent to Spy Island. 
The Kerr-McGee (70 percent), Armstrong Oil & Gas (30 percent) Nikaitchuq unit is at Spy Island, north of Oliktok Point and the Kuparuk River unit and northwest of the Milne Point unit. 
Kerr-McGee drilled two wells in what is now the Nikaitchuq unit last winter, and the company said in April that the Nikaitchuq No. 1 production tested more than 960 barrels per day of 38 degree API oil from the Sag River formation. The Nikaitchuq No. 2, drilled 9,000 feet southwest of the No. 1 well, “successfully extended the accumulation down dip,” the company said, although the second well was not tested. 
“This plan is to fully evaluate the Sag River this year, to know whether we have something to go ahead with or not,” Durkee said.