THE EXPLORERS 2005: GeoPetro buys Pioneer Oil’s Alaska C.I. leases

Alan Bailey

Petroleum News

GeoPetro Resources Co. has purchased Pioneer Oil Co.’s oil and gas leases in the Cook Inlet area of Alaska. According to the GeoPetro Web site the company “entered into an agreement dated April 20, 2005, wherein it has secured an option to acquire a 100 percent working interest in approximately 116,000 acres onshore in Cook Inlet, Alaska.” GeoPetro has confirmed to Petroleum News that it has exercised its option to purchase the leases.

GeoPetro was unwilling to discuss its strategy for the Cook Inlet area with Petroleum News until the company has firmed up its plans for the leases.

The company Web site describes GeoPetro as an independent oil and gas company headquartered in San Francisco with projects in North America, Australia and Indonesia.

Pioneer Oil originally purchased the leases at the State of Alaska’s May 2004 Cook Inlet areawide lease sale. The leases are in 27 tracts in primarily two onshore lease blocks — one west of Knik Arm, across from Anchorage, from north of Point MacKenzie to southwest of Wasilla, and the other on the west side of Cook Inlet, inland from Trading Bay and west of Aurora’s Nikolai Creek gas field. At the time of the lease sale Pioneer Oil hoped to explore for coalbed methane.

GeoPetro says that the leases are prospective for both coalbed methane and conventional gas in Tertiary sandstones. “Structural anticlines and/or domes occur on the lease blocks and probably contain large un-drilled gas reservoirs. Sandstone units also pinch-out toward the margins of the basin and may have formed stratigraphic traps on the lease blocks,” according to the company Web site.