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BlueCrest files 10th POD
Innovative C.I. producer seeks funding for oil drilling & gas project
Kay Cashman Petroleum News
BlueCrest Alaska Operating, the company with the largest known underdeveloped structure in Alaska's Cook Inlet basin, recently filed its 10th plan of development for state leases ADL018790, ADL384403, ADL391903 and ADL391904 which make up the Cosmopolitan unit. The 10th POD will run from Jan. 1 through Dec. 31, 2024.
The first well the company plans to drill is the H10 Trident Fishbone.
This multi-lateral well will allow BlueCrest to drill the equivalent of 21-24 wells on 800-foot spacings CFO John Martineck told Petroleum News earlier this year.
The Cosmopolitan unit's Hansen field is 3 miles offshore the southern Kenai Peninsula and 5 miles north of the community of Anchor Point.
Accessed from its onshore pad using directional drilling, its wells extend from the pad under Cook Inlet into state of Alaska submerged lands.
Production is primarily oil but there is an associated gas component to it.
Production is processed on site and oil is trucked off location for sale, while BlueCrest sells its natural gas to local utilities.
The company owns a drilling rig, which will be used for the H10 Trident well.
During the ninth POD BlueCrest planned to maintain production, conduct hot oil treatments and continue planning for drilling of the Hl0 well and potential offshore natural gas development.
These operations were completed as planned.
The company also completed an overhaul and engine exchange on its LP#l compressor.
BlueCrest installed hot oil treatment equipment onsite to allow it to perform treatments on demand and not rely on a third-party contractor. The company has been performing the treatments every three to four weeks. This helped with maintaining production levels in the facility.
BlueCrest was prepared to drill the Hl0 well, but due to lack of investment funding, will not be drilling the Hl0 well in 2023. However, the company spent a considerable amount of time refining the Hl0 well design, reworked the Hl0 AFE, and laid out the complete onshore oil drilling program.
In addition, BlueCrest explored/engineered alternatives to the offshore gas drilling campaign, looking at the possibility of drilling shallow ERD gas wells from onshore vs. installing a platform in the Cook Inlet to drill the gas wells.
BlueCrest's Hansen field averaged 703 barrels of oil per day in August, unchanged from July, and down 7.5% from an August 2022 average of 760 bpd.
Untapped gas reserves Currently BlueCrest is producing less than 1% Cook Inlet's natural gas.
BlueCrest President and CEO Benjamin Johnson told the Alaska House Special Committee on Energy on Feb. 21 about the huge natural gas reserves that have been discovered in the Cosmopolitan unit.
The Tyonek gas sands, which lie above the oil reservoirs the company is currently producing, look to be too shallow to be reached from onshore wells, he said.
Multiple wells have been drilled through the gas zones, which have a proved but undeveloped volume of 234 billion cubic feet with flow tests confirming high productivity, and the size and shape of the structure documented by 3D seismic.
Johnson said the gas zones are similar to the Ninilchik field, some 15 miles to the north and the largest Cook Inlet gas producer.
The gas at Tyonek was discovered in the Starichkof State 1 drilled in 1967 and confirmed in the Cosmopolitan State 1 drilled in 2013, both drilled by jack-up rigs, with flow tests done at the 2013 well.
Johnson said there are 12 gas sands at the Cosmopolitan Tyonek gas field.
Because of the requirement for a platform, it will cost hundreds of millions to develop that resource, Johnson said, but it could produce up to 50 million cubic feet per day.
He said this is dry gas, with no liquid hydrocarbons. It would require a 3-mile subsea pipeline to the company's onshore facility, and he said recent seafloor surveys confirm a safe pipeline route, while the onshore facility is already connected to the Enstar pipeline system.
The design of platform and facilities and cost estimates are largely completed, he said, with the platform gas wells to be done with standard Cook Inlet drilling and completion.
From funding to first gas would be 30 to 40 months, Johnson said.
Plans for 2024 BlueCrest's 10th POD is a repeat of the ninth POD. The company is actively looking for investment dollars to restart its onshore oil drilling with the H10 Trident Fishbone drilling program in the 2024 calendar year.
The company is also looking for investment dollars for its offshore gas development. The imminent gas shortage in Southcentral Alaska has made this objective a top priority for BlueCrest.
Parent BlueCrest Energy is a privately held oil and gas development company based in Fort Worth, Texas. Subsidiary BlueCrest Alaska Operating has a local office in Anchorage.
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