Exxon applies for Point Thomson reinjection

Company says initial production may be from existing well, which would be converted to injection after planned 3rd well completed

Kristen Nelson

Petroleum News

ExxonMobil Production Co. has applied to the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission for an area injection order for the Thomson sand reservoir in the Point Thomson unit. AOGCC said it has tentatively scheduled a public hearing for 9 a.m. July 7, but may issue an order without a hearing.

Initial production from the field is planned for the end of the winter of 2015-16.

In its application ExxonMobil said gas produced from the Thomson sand would be re-injected back into the Thomson Sand.

The Point Thomson initial production system project will bring natural gas and condensate to the surface, recover liquid condensate and re-inject residual gas back into the reservoir. The IPS project includes drilling wells, installing and operating infield pipelines and processing facilities and installing support facilities.

“In its full production mode after PTU-17 is drilled, the IPS will have one producing well (PTU-17) and two gas injection wells (PTU-15 and PTU-16),” ExxonMobil said, with gas cycled at a rate of some 200 million cubic feet per day and routed to the Central Processing Facility where up to 10,000 barrels per day of condensate will be extracted from the gas. Some of the gas will be used as fuel with the remainder re-injected “to help maintain reservoir pressure and conserve the gas for future development.”

ExxonMobil said one option under consideration “is commissioning the initial startup of the IPS processing facilities using the PTU-15 well as a producer and the PTU-16 well as a single injection well.” Those wells, drilled in 2009 and 2010, are on the Central Pad. Once the PTU-17 is drilled and completed, it would become the single producing well and PTU-15 would be converted to serve as the second injector well.

In addition to the two wells, pads, connecting roads, an airstrip, camps and other support infrastructure has been installed and the Point Thomson export pipeline constructed, ExxonMobil said.

In the first quarter of this year a UIC Class 1 nonhazardous disposal well was drilled, permitted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. In the first quarter and early second quarter of the year a flow line was installed from West Pad to Central Pad.

ExxonMobil said remaining work includes completion of the PTU-15 and PTU-16 wells on the Central Pad in the second and third quarters of the year. “PTU-15 is being completed in a manner such that it may be used to initiate production ... and then converted to injection service without requiring any downhole well work,” the company said.

The second half of the year will see the installation and commissioning of facility process modules which are being fabricated offsite and will be sealifted to Point Thomson.

PTU-17, a new development well, will be drilled in 2015 and 2016 on the West Pad and completed as a producer.

ExxonMobil, the Point Thomson operator, holds a 62.24 percent working interest at Point Thomson; BP Exploration (Alaska) holds a 32.04 percent interest; ConocoPhillips Alaska holds 4.96 percent; and 21 other owners have a combined working interest of less than 1 percent.