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Umiat appraisal wells in the works New independent formed by Renaissance, Rutter and Wilbanks, Arctic Falcon to appraise Alaska oil field, will drill in 2007-08 By Kay Cashman Petroleum News
Renaissance Alaska, Rutter and Wilbanks and Arctic Falcon have formed a limited liability company to evaluate and, if all goes well, develop the Umiat oil field on the northern edge of the Brooks Range Foothills. The foothills, also referred to as the North Slope Foothills, is the area south of the Umiat meridian, north of the disturbed belt of the Brooks Range, east of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska and west of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The partners have completed federal and state lease acquisitions that give their new company, Renaissance Umiat LLC, control of the undeveloped field, which was discovered in 1946. A shallow accumulation, the Umiat oil field straddles the eastern border of NPR-A.
Renaissance Umiat hopes to do appraisal drilling at Umiat in the winter of 2007-08, Renaissance executive Mark Landt told Petroleum News March 5.
The new company is currently controlled by Renaissance Alaska LLC (42.5 percent), Rutter and Wilbanks (42.5 percent) and Arctic Falcon (15 percent). “The field manager is Renaissance Alaska,” Landt said. (Renaissance expects to open its office in Resolution Plaza in Anchorage by March 12.)
“Last year we (Renaissance Alaska and Rutter and Wilbanks) acquired an Umiat lease from Paul Craig and Pete Zamarello in the northern portion of the field. Recently, we closed on Arctic Falcon’s interest in the southern portion of the field, and created Renaissance Umiat LLC — all the leasehold in the Umiat field,” Landt said.
“Renaissance Alaska and Rutter and Wilbanks will be the initial funding partners,” Landt said. (Renaissance Alaska has been funded by ARC Energy Fund 5, a private equity fund managed by Calgary-based ARC Financial Corp.)
“We put together a fairly unique structure in Renaissance Umiat, in that we aligned all leaseholders in one company as opposed to the more standard joint operating agreement. … We already have an agreement for cost sharing and how we manage the partnership going forward if we decide to develop the field. We won’t be in the position a lot of companies find themselves … after they finish the appraisal program and then have to resolve equity issues prior to moving forward,” Landt said.
Development strong possibility In May 2002, Greg Hebertson, who was doing corporate and strategic planning for Anadarko Petroleum at the time, spoke in Anchorage about his company’s geologic assessment of the Brooks Range Foothills. Some of the assessment’s results came from analyses of data from old wells in the Umiat field. (Then — and now — Anadarko and its partners held the largest block of acreage in the foothills, including plays in the Umiat area.)
“Reserves are questionable in that area, but we think there’s up to about 100 million barrels recoverable from Umiat,” Hebertson said.
In addition to presenting promising technical data on area source and reservoir rock, Hebertson talked about the trap component in the region, noting it had a “propensity for multiple structural traps as in the case of the Umiat field.”
“Seismic line across Umiat show hydrocarbons are reservoired in both the hanging wall and the foot wall of the structures,” he said.
“The seal capacity of traps — data from Umiat wells and field work and based on our analysis — … show the seals are there and certainly capable of holding large hydrocarbon columns. The risk associated with that is breaching either by erosion or fracturing.” Landt said there were 11 wells drilled in the 1940s and 1950s in the Umiat oil field by the U.S. Navy and a deeper test, the No. 1 Seabee drilled in 1979. The reason the field has not been developed is “generally due to the remoteness from infrastructure and pipelines and due to historically low oil prices,” he said.
The Umiat reservoir is shallow, 200 to 1,400 feet in depth, Landt said, with “a portion of the oil … in permafrost. That’s a challenge in itself.”
The company is looking at drilling several wells to “get some modern well data and then determine whether or not we have something commercial. We’ll do some horizontal drilling, and penetrate further into the reservoir, which will help us get a better understanding of what kind of recovery rate we can expect,” Landt said. “We look forward to working with the various North Slope communities, contractors and state and federal agencies to develop a cost effective and environmentally responsible plan to evaluate this existing oil field.”
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