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TotalFinaElf plans NPR-A well The exploration well will be the first in a multi-year drilling program Kay Cashman Petroleum News Publisher & Managing Editor
Next winter TotalFinaElf E&P USA is planning to drill its first well in a multi-well exploration program in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.
“One well for next winter is the plan right now,” Jack Bergeron, TotalFinaElf’s manager of Alaska operations, told Petroleum News April 25.
TotalFinaElf has begun the process of permitting five or six well locations in two of its three NPR-A lease blocks but will drill just one well next winter, the first in a multi-year NPR-A drilling program. No partnership announcements — yet The well will be drilled on 100 percent TotalFinaElf leases, Bergeron said. He would not comment on whether or not the company has found a partner for those leases. Mike Sangster, vice president of business development for TotalFinaElf in the United States, said Nov. 21 that the company was interested in partnering with other NPR-A leaseholders to explore and develop its 20 leases, picked up in a June 2002 NPR-A lease sale.
The 2003-2004 winter well will be drilled on either the Caribou or Fox exploration blocks from an ice exploration pad, the company has told government agencies.
Caribou East is in the vicinity of township 9N-range 4W, Umiat Meridian; T9N-R5W, UM; T10N-R5W, UM; and T9N-R6W, UM. Caribou West is in the vicinity of T9N-R7W, UM and T10N-R7W, UM. Fox is in the vicinity of T6N-R7W, UM and T7N-R5W, UM.
West of Caribou and Fox the company has a block of nine leases starting with T8N-R9W, UM and going up to T11N-R10W, UM. It will not be permitting any well locations on these leases this year, Bergeron said.
The company said a “rolligon transportable Arctic class land drilling rig” will be used to drill the 2003-2004 well, although a specific rig has not yet been chosen.
Drilling operations will be supported by both rolligon and aircraft, possibly using the 5,000 foot gravel airstrip at Inigok, which is between TotalFinaElf’s Caribou East and Fox prospects.
Under the company’s present plan, fuel will be flown in from Deadhorse “either to a purpose built ice strip close to the drilling location or to a fuel depot which would be installed at Inigok,” the company said.
TotalFinaElf is in the process of permitting an ice road from Meltwater.
Ballot agreements with the Prudhoe Bay unit owners for the disposal of waste mud and drill cuttings at an approved grind/inject facility at Prudhoe Bay are being negotiated, the company said.
TotalFinaElf, which will likely be renamed Total on May 6, re-entered Alaska in June 2002 with its purchase of the 20 NPR-A leases.
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