|
Chevron now participant at Borealis satellite field
Kristen Nelson
On Oct. 15, BP Exploration (Alaska) Inc. submitted revisions to the state for the Borealis participating area application. Chevron, BP said, is now a 2 percent participant in Borealis. BP also said that the proposed participating area had been slightly expanded to the north and west. ExxonMobil and the old Mobil interests have also been combined.
BP is the operator. Working interest owners at Borealis now include BP, ExxonMobil, Forest Oil, Phillips Alaska and Chevron.
Chevron had objected May 29 to BP’s March application to form the Borealis participating area, and told the state the proposed participating area “does not include that portion of the Northwest Eileen Kuparuk Reservoir underlying Chevron’s leases to the North, East and South of the proposed…” participating area.
Chevron also told the state that it anticipated that wells along the boundaries of the proposed participating area “will result in significant drainage from Chevron lands, particularly in the area around Z Pad to the south… because there is no geology or engineering evidence to indicate the existence of an impermeable barrier to justify partitioning of the Northwest Eileen Kuparuk Reservoirs for partial development.”
State issued interim Polaris decision in May Borealis is one of a group of southwest Prudhoe Bay satellite fields currently under development. At another such satellite, Polaris, failure of adjacent lease owners to reach agreement on acreage which should be included in the participating area led to a state hearing and an interim decision including the area in dispute.
The division said in its interim Polaris decision that it was more in agreement with Chevron, which wanted more acreage included, and less in agreement with BP, Phillips, ExxonMobil and Forest, who wanted only the northern area included.
Wells at Polaris had been producing on a tract basis, and the state said the May 11 interim decision was necessary since production authority for some of the wells already in production expired May 21 without a participating area.
The division said its final Polaris decision would conclude that a single participating area is appropriate for a number of reasons, among them that the applicant has failed to prove there is more than one reservoir; has used a definition of reservoir inconsistent with its prior use of the term and inconsistent with the use of the term in the Prudhoe Bay unit agreement; and that restricting the Polaris participating area to the northern area “would hinder optimal reservoir management.”
| 