Anadarko seeks exploration partner for Jacob’s Ladder southeast of Prudhoe Bay

Pat Healy

Petroleum News Contributing Writer

Independent Anadarko Petroleum is looking for partners to help fund exploration of its Jacob’s Ladder prospect on Alaska’s North Slope. The 100 percent Anadarko-owned leases cover approximately 175,000 acres some 20 miles southeast of Prudhoe Bay.

Company officials were on hand at the North American Prospects Exposition in Houston, Texas, Feb. 5-6, shopping for a 25-35 percent partner (or partners) to participate in exploring two reservoir objectives at Jacob’s Ladder that have been identified through recent interpretation of proprietary 3-D seismic data but have never been drilled.

The Jacob’s Ladder Lisburne prospect targets the carbonate Pennsylvanian Wahoo formation and the Jacob’s Ladder Ivishak prospect targets sandstones of the Ivishak formation. According to the company’s NAPE brochure, the Ivishak formation is “the primary producing sandstone at Prudhoe Bay field.” Anadarko estimates the Lisburne prospect is 20-660 million barrels of oil equivalent and the Ivishak Prospect is 50-800 million barrels of oil equivalent.

“Both prospects are located on the southern flank of the Barrow Arch, a Cretaceous-age thermal rift shoulder formed during successful rifting and subsequent opening of the Canada Basin,” Anadarko said in its brochure.

Anadarko describes the Lisburne play as an “unrecognized play type on the North Slope of Alaska” and compares the Jacob’s Ladder Lisburne prospect to such producing reservoirs as, “Yates Field in West Texas, USA, Golden Land Field in Mexico, and Vuktyl Field in Russia.”

When asked when Anadarko planned to drill at Jacob’s Ladder, Mark Hanley, the company’s Alaska spokesman, said, “Our focus right now is on getting our partners lined up.”

Hanley said that depending on where in the prospect a well was drilled and when drilling occurred, Jacob’s Ladder exploration wells would likely be eligible for a 20 percent severance tax credit from the state of Alaska under a program the state recently established to encourage wildcat drilling outside of producing areas.

Part of the working interest in some of the Jacob’s Ladder acreage was purchased by Anadarko from BP Exploration (Alaska) last year to consolidate Anadarko’s prospect. However, the prospect marketed by BP is not one of the prospects being marketed by Anadarko, Anadarko company officials said.

BP Exploration (Alaska) spokesman Daren Beaudo told Petroleum News last June that “BP’s purpose in the sale was to spur and accelerate new investment and production on the North Slope by other companies, including independents.”