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The beat moves west Conoco wants 34,000 state, ASRC acres onshore and offshore added to Colville unit Kristen Nelson Petroleum News Editor-in-Chief
ConocoPhillips Alaska has filed preliminary paperwork with the state of Alaska to expand the Colville River unit on Alaska’s North Slope to the northwest, adding some 34,000 acres onshore and offshore at Harrison Bay.
ConocoPhillips is the unit operator and has been producing the Alpine field at the Colville River unit since November 2000.
About half of the proposed expansion acreage, 17,149 acres, is in two onshore Arctic Slope Regional Corp. leases in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (see story on Alpine satellite draft EIS), and about half in 13 state of Alaska leases, 17,027 acres, in Harrison Bay.
The state leases are approaching their expiration dates, and inclusion in a unit would extend the life of the leases. Nine of the leases came from BP Nine of the state leases were acquired by BP Exploration (Alaska) in 1997 and expire Jan. 31, 2004. ConocoPhillips acquired them in June 2003, and assigned a 22 percent working interest to Anadarko Petroleum in August 2003. ConocoPhillips and Anadarko are 78/22 percent partners in the Colville River unit.
One of the leases was originally acquired by ARCO, and also expires Dec. 31, 2004.
Three of the leases were acquired by Phillips Alaska and Anadarko, and expire Jan. 31, 2005.
There are no wells in the prospect, ConocoPhillips told the state, but three-dimensional seismic has been acquired for a portion of the area, and processing and interpretation is expected to be completed by the end of 2004.
Nearby wells include the 1976 Husky Oil S. Harrison Bay 1 and the 1996 ARCO Temptation 1 and a sidetrack, the Temptation 1A. Iapetus prospect targeted In exchange for having this acreage added to the Colville River unit, ConocoPhillips proposes to commit in writing by Dec. 31, 2004, to drill the Iapetus No. 1 by June 1, 2005. If that commitment is not made, the leases would contract out of the unit on Dec. 31 and expire according to their terms.
By June 1, 2005, the companies would commit in writing to drill a second well, the Iapetus No. 2, by June 1, 2006, with a bottom hole at least a mile from the Iapetus No. 1, or the expansion area would contract out of the unit June 1, 2005. If the commitment to drill is made, but the second well is not drilled, the acreage would contract out of the unit and the companies would pay $318,700 proportionately to the state and ASRC.
ConocoPhillips also proposed that the expansion area be included in an approved participating area within five years of its inclusion in the unit. Other expansions The Colville River unit was approved in 1998, and expanded in 2000 and 2002.
The 2000 expansion added five leases to the north of the unit “viewed as having significant exploration potential in the same or similar geologic horizons discovered in the 1999 Fiord exploration program.” Owner companies (then Phillips Alaska and Anadarko), told the state the gross proven and potential Fiord reserves within the current unit were estimated at 40-50 million barrels of oil, and said they hoped to add reserves to Fiord by exploration and delineation drilling.
A major expansion, primarily to the south and southeast of the unit, some 60,000 acres, was approved in 2002. The Oberon expansion area, 26,624 acres on the southeast corner of the unit, contracted out after ConocoPhillips and Anadarko decided in 2003 not to drill a second Oberon well, following poor results from the first well.
The other large block of acreage, some 16,259 acres west of the Oberon acreage, requires a well this winter season. Smaller expansions at Fiord and Nanuq, part of the current Alpine satellite development plan, required inclusion in participating areas within five years.
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