At a recent hearing in Anchorage, RDC urged the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to expand oil and gas exploration and development in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A), and allow for infrastructure development to carry offshore oil and gas resources to the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS).

RDC also urged the Department of the Interior to consider asking Congress to open NPR-A to mineral exploration, given world-class deposits likely exist in its southern areas.

The hearing was held to seek public input on the Draft Integrated Activity Plan/Environmental Impact Statement (IAP/EIS) for NPR-A. One option in the plan, Alternative B, would close more than half of the 23-million acre energy reserve to development and set it aside for conservation purposes. Most of the coastal areas, considered to be among the most oil-rich lands in NPR-A, would be closed to development.

RDC urged BLM to include solid provisions in the IAP/EIS for efficient transportation corridors within NPR-A to facilitate future oil and gas development in the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) and potential offshore development in state waters of the Beaufort Sea.

With regard to state leases in the Beaufort Sea, RDC is concerned that development of these assets could be hindered or precluded by the designation of Special Areas spanning the coastline. The Draft IAP/EIS currently precludes a pipeline corridor through the Special Areas, potentially stranding offshore reserves.

“Given NPR-A is a petroleum reserve, BLM should manage the area in a manner that facilities oil and gas production and the development of vital infrastructure for both onshore and offshore development,” RDC said. The significant enlargement of Special Areas and proposed Wild and Scenic River designations, could affect the ability of onshore and offshore operators to lease areas for development, as well as build and operate infrastructure necessary to transport oil and gas to market. In addition, such designations could diminish the potential recovery of much needed energy resources for Alaska and the nation.”

Alaska and the federal government have already designated significant portions of Alaska for conservation purposes. In fact, Alaska contains 90 percent of all national park lands, more than 80 percent of national wildlife refuge lands, and more than half of all federally-designated Wilderness. The Special Areas proposed for NPR-A are essentially de-facto wilderness that would block exploration of highly prospective areas of the energy reserve.

Although the IAP acknowledges that land management practices in NPR-A should provide for necessary pipelines and other infrastructure to carry OCS resources to TAPS, each of the proposed alternatives include significant restrictions which could inhibit permitting and construction of a pipeline across the reserve.

“We believe that under Alternative B there would be no way to get across the NPR-A” for a pipeline from the Chukchi Sea to TAPS, Lon Kelly, BLM’s Anchorage field office manager told the Alaska Journal of Commerce.

A pipeline is essential to deliver oil from the Chukchi Sea to TAPS. The potential 27 billion barrels of oil offshore could reduce the nation’s trade deficit by $25 billion annually, generate more than $193 billion in government revenues, create an annual average of 55,000 new jobs, $145 billion in new payroll, and add up to one million barrels per day to TAPS – Alaska’s economic lifeline.

The State of Alaska warned that several alternatives in the proposed plan selectively disregards congressional direction provided under the law that set up NPR-A. “We believe the plan inappropriately applies administrative policy to the Reserve,” said Ed Fogels, Deputy Director of the Alaska Department of Natural Resources. “Instead of planning for the Reserve for the purpose for which it was established, as a petroleum reserve, the draft plan implies the area should instead be managed as a conservation unit.”

Even in areas that can be leased, the plan calls for complex setback requirements from numerous lakes and rivers that would make the development of surface infrastructure, including pipelines, challenging, if not impossible, many at the hearing warned.

Richard Garrard, a geologist with extensive experience in NPR-A, said that geologic conditions in closed areas along the coast are optimal for large oil and gas discoveries. Garrard explained that virtually all commercial North Slope oil and gas discoveries have occurred exclusively within a 25-mile strip of the Beaufort Sea coastline – a geologic structure known as the Barrow Arch. He said that the south flank of the arch contains subtle stratigraphic and combination traps that only recently have become identifiable on modern 3-D seismic. “Many of the primary reservoir targets associated with these traps rapidly deteriorate to the south and are no longer valid at distances greater than 25 miles from the coast,” Garrard told BLM. Acreage that would be offered for leasing is well south of the coast.

The Alaskan geologist said previously that updated U.S. Geologic Survey estimates for oil discoveries in NPR-A are too low, partly due to the lack of exploratory drilling in highly prospective areas.

 

 

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