BOEM announces start of Liberty EIS

Close behind an announcement that Hilcorp Alaska LLC had submitted a development plan for the Liberty oil field, offshore in federal waters of the Beaufort Sea, the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has formally stated its intent to develop an environmental impact statement for the development. In a Sept. 25 announcement in the Federal Register, the agency said that it is beginning the scoping process for the EIS - the agency has previously commented that the EIS could take several years to prepare.

At this point the agency is inviting input regarding any historic properties that the development may impact. And the agency is scheduling a series of public meetings to be held in early November to solicit comments on the scope of the EIS. The scope will be expressed in terms of development alternatives assessed, the range of issues raised by the development and environmental mitigation measures that need to be considered.

As reported in the Sept. 27 issue of Petroleum News, Hilcorp proposes developing the field from an artificial gravel island in 19 feet of water about 5 miles from the North Slope coast. In 2014 Hilcorp acquired a 50 percent interest in the field from BP, the previous field operator. BP had originally planned a field development from a gravel island, along the same lines as what Hilcorp is now proposing. However, in 2005 BP switched to a different plan, involving ultra-extended-reach drilling from the satellite drilling island for the Endicott field. BP pursued that plan to the point of expanding the drilling island and installing a massive rig for the drilling of development wells. However, amid safety concerns following the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, in November 2010 BP cancelled the Liberty project.

As the new field operator, Hilcorp has revived the artificial island development concept. The company has said the field is capable of producing between 80 million and 150 million barrels of oil over a 15- to 20-year field life.

- ALAN BAILEY