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BLM to lease more tracts in northeast NPR-A north of lake
The Bureau of Land Management will have the final amended plan/environmental impact statement for its Northeast National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska planning area out for public comment soon, with a preferred alternative which opens the area north of Teshekpuk Lake to leasing in seven large tracts.
Henri Bisson, BLM’s Alaska state director, described the plan to the Resource Development Council Jan. 20.
BLM began reviewing decisions made in the 1998 northeast plan in 2002 and released a draft plan amendment/EIS in June 2004. That plan drew more than 220,000 comments, Bisson said, all of which have been analyzed and considered.
As to why the 1998 plan was revisited, Bisson said government geologists have revised their estimates of oil and gas in the northeast corner of the NPR-A, and now believe there could be more than 2 billion barrels of economically recoverable oil and 3.5 trillion cubic feet of gas. Under the 1998 plan, he said, “about 56 percent of the area with the highest oil and gas potential is off limits to leasing or exploration” or encumbered with no-surface activity restrictions and exploration was prohibited on more than 840,000 acres.
Bisson said industry has demonstrated and the agency’s own studies confirm that winter exploration with ice roads and low-pressure tired vehicles can be done safely without unduly harming vegetation, and with minimal impact on wildlife. More land available Under the proposed alternative, Bisson said, “significantly” more land will be available for leasing and winter exploration, but BLM is “going to defer leasing of Teshekpuk Lake itself, about 211,000 acres,” because the lake has sensitive fisheries and wildlife values and “would be very challenging both economically and technically to explore and develop at this time.”
The amended plan divides the area north of Teshekpuk Lake into seven large tracts, ranging in size from some 46,000 to 59,000 acres, available for leasing and winter exploration. In the past, BLM leased high-potential tracts in 5,000-acre leases, Bisson said.
The change to large leases “would allow successful lessees flexibility to find and appropriately develop oil resources using directional drilling methods,” with minimal impact on wildlife resources. Within those seven tracts, 217,000 acres have been identified as key habitat for molting geese and other waterfowl, and as important insect relief areas for caribou, and no permanent surface occupancy will be allowed, with the exception of pipelines and publicly funded community roads. In the June 2004 draft plan, 213,000 acres of this area north of the lake were off limits to leasing, BLM spokeswoman Jody Weil told Petroleum News. Limitations within tracts East of the lake, some 16,500 acres is an important caribou migration route and no permanent surface occupancy of any kind will be permitted; this prohibition includes pipelines and community roads.
South and southeast of the lake 141,000 acres are important for caribou calving and insect relief and no permanent surface occupancy will be allowed with the exception of pipelines and publicly funded community roads.
Within the seven proposed lease tracts north of the lake, Bisson said specific areas have been identified where development could occur — and where it could not occur.
And each of the seven tracts would have a maximum limit of 300 acres of permanent surface disturbance permitted. The 300 acres does not include “linear features” such as pipelines.
Bisson said the 300 acres is basically a limit on new gravel. He said BLM estimates that 300 acres of gravel pads will be enough for production, satellites and in-field transportation. “In reality,” Bisson said, “we expect only one production facility will be located north of the lake and shared by lessees,” with the remaining gravel used for satellites. Additional protections South of Teshekpuk Lake, all the deep water lakes will have one-quarter mile buffers. The 1998 decision protected only lakes within specified land areas.
An additional river will be protected with setback provisions and subsistence consultation requirements will be expanded to include the entire planning area, compared to the 1998 plan, which required consultation for only portions of several buffers.
BLM is also shifting to “performance-based stipulations,” Bisson said, to give it increased flexibility. “Our management goal is for industry to have just one set of rules for the entire reserve,” he said. This change will also give BLM flexibility to adapt its management strategy as it learns more, without have to go through a lengthy and costly plan amendment process. Fight expected Bisson said that the environmental groups who organized the massive letter- and e-mail-writing campaign against amending the 1998 plan have indicated they want no changes made in the original plan, and have said they will sue to keep the changes from happening.
Once the amendment is released there will be a 30-day public comment period, and, Bisson said, if the secretary of the Department of the Interior agrees with the BLM recommendation, the agency expects to have a lease sale in July in the northeast portion of NPR-A.
—Kristen Nelson
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