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Aurora Gas, Forest Oil bid at Mental Health Trust sale
Kristen Nelson
Aurora Gas LLC and Forest Oil Corp. were the apparent high bidders Feb. 15 on two tracts offered at an Alaska Mental Health Trust Land Office oil and gas lease sale. The Trust Land Office received four bids on two tracts of five offered in the onshore west side Cook Inlet Tyonek-area offering.
Mike Franger, The Trust Land Office’s senior resource manager, said at the opening that the tracts offered were previously leased but the leases had recently expired.
Aurora Gas bid $11.04 an acre on tract 38, west-northwest of Tyonek and was the only bidder on that tract.
Tract 42, north of Tyonek, received three bids: $6.21 an acre from Aurora Gas; $6.80 an acre from Pelican Hill Oil and Gas; and an apparent high bid from Forest Oil of $22.50 an acre. Pelican Hill has Mental Health Trust Land oil and gas leases adjacent to tract 42; Forest Oil has a state oil and gas lease north of tract 42. Pelican shooting seismic The Trust Land Office conducted its first lease sale in September, attracting nine bids for eight tracts and leasing some 40,000 acres.
Pelican Hill acquired its first Alaska leases in that sale, five tracts in the Tyonek area, and is currently shooting seismic in the area.
Forest Oil operates the producing West McArthur River unit on the west side of Cook Inlet. The company has exploration drilling under way from the Osprey platform at Redoubt Shoal and plans in the works to turn Osprey into a producing platform. Forest also has production from non-operated interests in the inlet.
Aurora Gas has exploration prospects on both sides of Cook Inlet and gas production from Nicolai Creek south of the tract on which Aurora was high bidder in this sale.
Franger said The Trust Land Office be offering tracts that didn’t receive bids at this sale, tracts from the previous sale and new tracts on the Kenai Peninsula at a sale in the fall.
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