Hilcorp applies to expand Beluga gas pool

Kristen Nelson

Petroleum News

Hilcorp Alaska, operator of the Beluga River unit, has applied to the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission for vertical expansion of the Sterling-Beluga gas pool to include shallower sands.

In a June 27 application the company asked for an amendment to rule 2 of Conservation Order 802 "to vertically expand the Sterling-Beluga Gas Pool within BRU."

The request is to change the rule to define the Sterling-Beluga accumulation as the interval between 3,097 feet and 7,000 feet measured depth with BRU 224-13 as the reference well; the current rule, dated 2022, is for a depth of 3,345 feet to 7,000 feet MD. The reference well remains the same.

The company said expansion would allow it to "perforate and produce various sands that lie above the currently defined Sterling-Beluga Gas Pool ... and comingle production with sands located in the Sterling-Beluga Gas Pool."

Hilcorp said that as the gas pool is currently defined in the conservation order producing the shallower sands would "likely require individual spacing exceptions and/or commingling approval from AOGCC on a well-by-well basis."

Vertical expansion of the pool definition would allow the company to "target smaller, un-drained portions of heterogeneous sand bodies that cannot produce on their own" without requesting well-by-well approval.

Hilcorp said BRU 232-04 is the first well where it plans to target shallower Sterling sands and said it has identified up to four additional wells where it may apply the same method.

Hilcorp said its "objective is to maximize the recovery of remaining hydrocarbons from the field," and said without this change it would be required to make "strenuous and lengthy administrative requests" to AOGCC. The company said while the existing rule may have once been necessary to protect correlative rights and prevent waste, "the current rules are not applicable to the effort to explore, produce and develop the remaining hydrocarbon reserves in BRU."

AOGCC has tentatively scheduled a public hearing on the request for Sept. 3 at 10 a.m. but said if a request for hearing is not timely filed it may issue an order without a hearing. Call 907-793-1223 after Aug. 2 to learn if the hearing will be held.

--KRISTEN NELSON