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Aurora puts west Cook Inlet gas field online Pleased with Kaloa well results, Moquawkie goes online, Texaco Long Lake No. 1 well next Kay Cashman Petroleum News Publisher & Managing Editor
Aurora Gas LLC, a niche player in Alaska’s Cook Inlet basin, said July 27 it is pleased with the results of its Kaloa No. 2 well and expects to put the Kaloa gas field online early in the fourth quarter. The company also said natural gas production has begun at its Moquawkie field.
Both fields are onshore on the west side of Cook Inlet.
Aurora said it “perforated and tested four separate intervals at a combined flow rate of approximately 10 million cubic feet per day” at the Kaloa well. The well, expected to produce at a rate of 5 million cubic feet per day for the first year before it sees any decline, is expected to come online “early in the fourth quarter,” Aurora President G. Scott Pfoff told Petroleum News July 28.
He said the Moquawkie No. 1 well has a flow rate of 5 million cubic feet per day without compression.
Like Aurora’s other two producing onshore Cook Inlet fields — Nicolai Creek and Lone Creek — Kaloa and Moquawkie contain natural gas deposits that were discovered in the search for oil in Cook Inlet that began in the 1950s.
Kaloa No. 2 was a re-drill of Kaloa No.1, an oil well drilled in 1967 by Pan American.
The Kaloa No. 1 “tested gas, and was put on production briefly; however, the operator shut it in almost immediately as a result of sand-up problems,” Pfoff said. “However, we now have methods for controlling sand production and the demand for natural gas in Cook Inlet is high, making the development of smaller fields an economically attractive endeavor for Aurora.”
At Moquawkie Aurora reestablished production by re-entering and re-completing the Mobil Moquawkie No. 1 well late last year.
Ed Jones, Aurora Gas vice president of operations, told Petroleum News in a previous interview that there are more old wells in the Moquawkie area, some of which the company might re-enter “at some point.”
Aurora is “built on the belief that tremendous amounts of economically recoverable shallow gas reserves exist on Cook Inlet’s west side, much of which has already been discovered but is in need of development,” Pfoff said in a previous interview.
When companies were exploring Cook Inlet for oil in the 1950s and 1960s, they found a lot of gas, “sometimes they knew it and they tested it, sometimes they didn’t, they just blew right through it with heavy mud that invaded the zones,” he said.
Aurora focuses on what is known, Pfoff said: “Our whole niche is to use those logs and the geology and the well control and then some of the seismic that’s been shot since, and put together a puzzle to go back in and find low-risk opportunities to develop natural gas.” One more well for Kaloa, $3 per mcf Aurora said Kaloa No. 2, drilled 60 feet from Kaloa No. 1 and producing from the Carya formation, was drilled to a total depth of about 3,700 feet and encountered 150 feet of net pay at depths between 3,158 and 3,552 feet.
“Aurora will install compression, dehydration and a short gathering line. Kaloa will utilize the existing interconnection with Beluga Pipe Line. The gathering line will be 4 inch pipe and be approximately one-half mile long,” Pfoff said.
When asked about the reserves at Kaloa, he said the company would have a much better idea of the reserves after the field has come online. “I can tell you that we ran our economics assuming a minimum of 10 billion cubic feet recoverable.”
Aurora plans to market the gas to Enstar Natural Gas Co. “pursuant to an existing contractual arrangement … at approximately $3 per mcf (thousand cubic feet) … and sell volumes above its Enstar commitment to other customers in south-central Alaska,” Pfoff said.
Based upon Aurora’s “current mapping of the reservoir, it appears at least one more well should be drilled at Kaloa,” he said. Pleased with progess on west side Aurora previously announced that Moquawkie No. 1 had tested 7.6 million cubic feet per day, but said on July 27 that it expected it to produce at 5 million cubic feet per day. The company has been working on installation of production facilities, a 4.4 mile pipeline and an interconnection with the Marathon owned and operated Beluga Pipe Line. The Moquawkie No. 1 is currently the only well online in the field; however, Pfoff said Auroria will soon test the Simpco Moquawkie well and depending on the results, may have it on stream by the fourth quarter.” He said Aurora is assessing the reserve situation at Moquawkie.
“We are extremely pleased with our progress on the west side,” said Jones. “Our first few wells have had to justify and carry the economic burden of facilities, gathering lines and interconnections. Future wells will be much easier and less expensive to add to the system.” Texaco well next, encouraged by Three Mile seismic The company is now in the process of mobilizing the Aurora Well Service Rig No. 1 to an exploratory re-entry of the Texaco Long Lake No. 1 well, which Texaco “drilled in 1973 looking for oil, but plugged and abandoned as a dry hole, therefore, it is not in a designated field,” Pfoff said.
On the west side of Cook Inlet, the well is on a lease Aurora acquired in the 2002 lease sale held by the Mental Health Trust.
When asked about plans for drilling in the newly formed Three Mile Creek unit, Aurora Pfoff said he was “very encouraged by the seismic we shot over Three Mile Creek this past winter” and that Aurora is “working closely with our partner, Forest Oil, to determine if and when a well should be drilled.”
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