Final finding for North Slope Foothills

Kristen Nelson

Petroleum News

The Alaska Division of Oil and Gas has issued a final written finding of the director for proposed North Slope Foothills Areawide Oil and Gas lease sales 2021-30. Division Director Tom Stokes signed off on the finding, issued June 24, and Department of Natural Resources Commissioner Corri Feige signed as concurring.

Best interest findings are issued every 10 years; the division then issues annual calls for any substantial new information which has become available since issuance of the most recent best interest finding.

The division initiated the 10-year review for the North Slope Foothills areawide in May 2020; a preliminary best interest finding and request for public comments were issued this February with comments due April 26.

After weighing the facts and issues, the finding says, “The director finds that the potential benefits of lease sales outweigh the possible negative effects, and that the North Slope Foothills Areawide oil and gas lease sales will best serve the interests of the State of Alaska.”

No bids were received in the most recent North Slope Foothills sale held earlier this year; there are just a handful of active leases shown in the foothills area map that is part of the BIF.

“Except for the Umiat oil accumulation, oil and gas discoveries to date within the Arctic Foothills physiographic region have been primarily dry gas trapped in anticlinal fold closures, identified from early surface geologic mapping and supported by two-dimensional reflection seismic surveys,” the division said.

Major new oil finds are unlikely because formation outcrops and well data indicate source rocks in the Arctic Foothills “have likely reached advanced thermal maturity due to deep sediment burial,” the division said. Geology, geophysics and exploration are sparsely distributed for the sale area, with the potential for conventional recoverable petroleum “relatively high for gas, and relatively low for oil.”

- KRISTEN NELSON