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Denver independent files for Susitna exploration license
Kay Cashman Petroleum News Publisher & Managing Editor
Clearflame Resources LLC of Denver, Colo., a new player in Alaska, has filed a proposal with the state of Alaska for a 499,840 acre exploration license in the Susitna Basin in Southcentral Alaska.
The proposed license area is west of the Parks Highway and surrounds Forest Oil’s proposed exploration license area on all but the northeast corner, extending as much as 30 miles to the west.
State Division of Oil and Gas Lease Manager Jim Hansen said June 23 that the state was working with Clearflame on the final terms of the license. He said there were no competitive proposals for the bid and he expects it to be approved by the end of July.
Jim Dodson, formerly executive vice president of Andex Resources which has an exploration license in Alaska’s Nenana Basin, recently left Andex to go to work for Clearflame (see Petroleum News, Oil Patch Insider, June 1 issue.) Fidelity executives Privately held, Clearflame was formed in February by a group of individuals who had been in executive positions in Denver-based Fidelity Exploration and Production Co., a subsidiary of MDU Resources Group Inc. (NYSE: MDU). Fidelity’s roots go back to 1930 when Fidelity Gas Co. was incorporated.
On its web page, Fidelity is described as a company that “is engaged in natural gas and oil acquisition, exploration and production activities primarily in the Rocky Mountain region of the United States and in the Gulf of Mexico.”
In April 2000, Clearflame’s owners had sold the assets of their Denver-based company, Preston Reynolds & Co. Inc. and its operating arm Redstone Gas Partners LLC, to Fidelity.
The addition of Preston Reynolds’ assets to Fidelity’s more traditional portfolio of properties caused an “internal realignment of operations and philosophy,” Fidelity said, resulting in the company's headquarters being moved from Bismarck, N.D., to Denver in late 2000.
With this acquisition, Fidelity said, “came significant coalbed natural gas lease positions in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming and Montana.” … creating “one of the larger E & P operations in the Rocky Mountain region.”
At the end of 2002, Fidelity’s net lease position exceeded 232,000 acres and included “more than 5,000 potential well locations,” the company said.
“Natural gas and oil production in the year 2002 reached 60 Bcfe. The company's reserve base grew to 477 Bcfe, 79 percent of which is comprised of natural gas,” Fidelity said. Clearflame’s Susitna target is gas “Right now Clearflame is focusing on Alaska,” Dodson told Petroleum News June 26, “but we have an acreage position in Wyoming (and) will be working other areas, as well.”
The company, he said, will be targeting natural gas in the Susitna exploration license area. If Clearflame finds gas, it will look at building a pipeline to connect to Enstar’s system, “14 miles from the edge of our block,” for transport to the Anchorage market.
Dodson was in Fairbanks, Alaska, on June 26 for Doyon’s golf tournament.
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