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The Osprey has landed Forcenergy platform set in Cook Inlet June 28; company hopes to be drilling exploration wells by end of September Kristen Nelson PNA News Editor
Forcenergy Inc. set its Osprey platform at Redoubt Shoals in Cook Inlet early in the morning of June 28 and hopes to begin exploratory drilling before the end of September.
The Osprey platform is the 16th in Cook Inlet, the first since Steelhead was installed in 1986, and the first at an undeveloped field since the original 14 platforms were installed in the 1960s, Gary Carlson, Forcenergy’s vice president for Alaska, told PNA after the successful positioning of the platform offshore West Foreland.
Forcenergy acquired existing leases at Redoubt Shoal in October 1996. The Redoubt Shoal oil field was discovered in the 1960s when Cook Inlet was being explored and additional drilling was done in the 1970s, but the size of the field was not known for sure and it had never been developed. In 1997, the state agreed to Forcenergy’s plan to form a unit of the five leases at the field in exchange for the company’s agreement to acquire three-dimensional seismic over the area and drill an exploratory well. Forcenergy acquired the seismic in October 1997 and installation of the platform makes drilling an exploratory well possible, Carlson said in a May 12 discussion of project progress at the Alaska Support Industry Alliance.
Innovation required Cook Inlet lacks the infrastructure to support offshore exploratory drilling, Carlson told the Alliance. In the Gulf of Mexico, he said, you could have a jack-up offshore drilling rig on site in a few weeks and an exploratory well would cost $5-$6 million. Mobilizing a jack-up rig to Cook Inlet would have raised the cost of a single well to the $25-$26 million range, he said, so “in putting this project together we had to think of some unique concepts and get creative because of the cost.”
For instance, the company got more competitive bids on the platform by building it in pieces. Quarters for the platform were built by VECO in Anchorage; the deck and legs for the platform were constructed in Korea and joined at Port Graham earlier in June before being barged into place June 28.
Because mobilizing a derrick barge to Alaska to set the platform would have cost $10-$15 million, the Osprey platform was designed to be set into place with barges and pilings will be driven using platform cranes.
Platform arrived on barge Carlson told PNA June 28 that working with the tides was crucial and the tugs got the platform on location about 2-2:30 in the morning.
Cook Inlet, he said, is “as complicated as any body of water anywhere” — where the platform was installed, off the West Foreland, “there is no true slack tide, it just changes direction.”
Carlson credited installation contractor Stolt Comex Seaway for an excellent job in planning and design for the installation, and said key subcontractor Crowley made it all work. Several people working on the project with Stolt Comex had worked in Alaska before, Carlson said, and had a lot of diving experience in Cook Inlet so they “were well aware of the issues that are faced technically in a body of water like Cook Inlet.”
“And Captain (Al) Anderson (with Crowley) is one of the best in the world at what he does. We had a really strong team,” he said.
“Captain Al Anderson with Crowley informed us all that the Osprey had landed,” Carlson said. “It touched down at about 4:30 a.m.”
A critical part of that installation was to be able to pull the launch barge out from between the platform legs before the tide started coming back in — and that happened within an hour of touchdown. At about 5:30 a.m., Carlson said, Anderson reported that the barge had come out “like a greased pig.”
Piles next step Piles will be driven after the Fourth of July, Carlson said, and the platform should be fully installed before the end of July.
The mating of the deck and legs of the platform was done in Port Graham, and the Port Graham Corp. supported the project with logistics, expediting and housing. Carlson said there was quite a flotilla at the installation site off the West Forelands: Tugs from Crowley and Cook Inlet Tug and Barge and a smaller barge from Homer were accompanied by a Coast Guard clipper providing security.
Forcenergy hopes to be drilling before the end of September. Carlson said that Nabors Alaska Drilling is putting the rig together in Anchorage and will start mobilizing around mid-August. The 1 Redoubt Shoal unit well is planned to a true vertical depth of 12,500 feet, Forcenergy’s president and chief executive officer, Richard Zepernick Jr., said in a June 29 statement.
Zepernick said platform installation was “ahead of schedule and within budget.”
Just the first project The company said that Redoubt Shoal is the first of several high potential projects to be undertaken from the company’s Alaska inventory. Forcenergy holds approximately 200,000 acres of developed and undeveloped acreage in the Cook Inlet basin with numerous prospects and leads identified, the company said.
Other planned Alaska activities for 2000 include the drilling of an onshore exploratory well adjacent to Forcenergy-controlled infrastructure and an exploitation well in the West McArthur River unit, along with development activity within the Unocal-operated McArthur River field.
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