[copious.abundance]

You gotta figure those Alaskan North Slope oil fields must have some nice source rocks somewhere. And since they're figuring out how to coax the oil out of source rocks in North Dakota and elsewhere, it was inevitable they'd eventually mosey on up to Prudhoe Bay's source rocks and do the same thing there. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, may I have you attention please: Alaska is about to get frakked!

LINK

Texas Independent's Plan Could be 'Game Changer' for Alaska
by Tim Bradner|Alaska Journal of Commerce|Monday, December 06, 2010

A newly formed Texas-based independent that recently acquired 537,000 acres of state of Alaska leases on the North Slope has plans to drill into source rocks below the region's prolific producing fields and produce oil by fracturing, a company official said Nov. 24.

"This is a new play for the North Slope but the rock types are right for this to be viable and the exploitation technology can be easily transferred from the Lower 48 states," where fracturing is now widely used to produce from tight shale rocks, said Ed Duncan, president of Great Bear Petroleum LLC.

"It could be a game-changer for the North Slope," Duncan said.

Great Bear was formed earlier this year and is based near Austin, Texas. The company is privately held. Duncan and other professionals working in the company previously worked on the North Slope for BP, ExxonMobil and other producers, Duncan said.

[...]

Another article on the lease sale from back in October can be found here. And from the sound of it, seems like these guys know what they're talking about.

There are five principals in Great Bear Petroleum, Duncan said, and while only he and Rosenthal have worked in Alaska, he said all of the principals are long-time colleagues.

Duncan and Rosenthal started working Alaska in the late 1970s, he said, Rosenthal initially with Exxon; starting in 1982 the two worked together at Sohio (BP’s predecessor in Alaska).

Plans for Great Bear came together earlier this year, Duncan said.

“We have new ideas, a very high-level working knowledge — expert knowledge — of the petroleum systems of the Slope,” he said.

“We believe that there are expansive new plays and we’ve captured a very significant piece of what we came here to do” in the sale, he said, characterizing the company’s bids as “purposed; it clearly wasn’t just rank speculation or checkerboard leasing.”

Lastly is an overview of the petroleum system of the North Slope here (PDF).

So much excitement!

[Cog]

Yes this is very exciting. Please Frack Off.

[Plantagenet]

Thanks OilFiinder.

I hadn't heard about this oil play.

There would be no need for frakking on the north slope if ANWR and the Chukchi were open to oil exploration, but this might keep the oil companies interested in Alaska until we can get a more sensible administration in DC.

[Cog]

Planty has become a cornie. This is truly a memorable moment.

[Plantagenet]

Planty has become a cornie. This is truly a memorable moment.

Corgie is having a fantasy. Truly a moment to forget.

[vision-master]

Planty has become a cornie. This is truly a memorable moment.

Anyone here calls me a cornie and I'm done with this place.

[copious.abundance]

Another nifty article. Straight for the jugular!

CLICKY HERE

Great Bear Petroleum, the company that starred in the State of Alaska’s Oct. 27 North Slope lease sale by picking up more than 500,000 acres south of Kuparuk and Prudhoe Bay, sees itself as a game changer in the North Slope oil and gas industry, Ed Duncan, the company’s president and chief operating officer, told Petroleum News on Oct. 28. Rather than drilling for hydrocarbons in porous reservoir rocks, the company plans to go straight for the jugular, drilling right into oil and gas source rocks, and then using horizontal drilling techniques and intense fracturing, or fracing, of the rocks to entice oil and gas to the surface.

[Xenophobe]

You gotta figure those Alaskan North Slope oil fields must have some nice source rocks somewhere. And since they're figuring out how to coax the oil out of source rocks in North Dakota and elsewhere, it was inevitable they'd eventually mosey on up to Prudhoe Bay's source rocks and do the same thing there. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, may I have you attention please: Alaska is about to get frakked!

But of course. Anytime you have more oil laying around than the original Prudhoe Bay inplace figures, sooner or later...the usual happens....besides peakers being wrong I mean....

http://www.oildrop.org/Info/Centre/Lib/ ... 950017.pdf

[ian807]

A Bakken? You mean kerogen locked in high-density, low porosity shale that needs to be ground up and heated, making it hugely expensive with an EREOI just north of zilch? Well, by golly. We're saved! Break out the champagne. Have a cigar! Whoop! Whoop!

[Xenophobe]

A Bakken? You mean kerogen locked in high-density, low porosity shale that needs to be ground up and heated, making it hugely expensive with an EREOI just north of zilch? Well, by golly. We're saved! Break out the champagne. Have a cigar! Whoop! Whoop!

Actually...no...the Bakken is 42 API, sweet and light oil. Let me guess, you've been listening to peakers on the topic of oil again, haven't you? You'll learn...or you'll keep confusing oil shales with shale oil and make the entire congregation look bad!

[ian807]

Actually...no...the Bakken is 42 API, sweet and light oil. Let me guess, you've been listening to peakers on the topic of oil again, haven't you? You'll learn...or you'll keep confusing oil shales with shale oil and make the entire congregation look bad!

42 API? For the whole of it? I joke. I joke!

Perhaps you can explain why the entire USA isn't up there drilling away? Here in Houston, it's not exactly a hot topic for discussion, but what do we know about oil?

[copious.abundance]

42 API? For the whole of it? I joke. I joke!

Perhaps you can explain why the entire USA isn't up there drilling away? Here in Houston, it's not exactly a hot topic for discussion, but what do we know about oil?

I do believe someone isn't paying attention to, like ... everything ... to do with oil in the US the past 3 years. What planet have you been living on?

Just about every oil company in Houston has a big presence in the Bakken these days. Except maybe Chevron, I think. Even Exxon is there now with its purchase of XTO.

Notice the big uptick in production of 40-ish degree light sweet crude from North Dakota's Bakken shale.

[Xenophobe]

Perhaps you can explain why the entire USA isn't up there drilling away? Here in Houston, it's not exactly a hot topic for discussion, but what do we know about oil?

Apparently not the difference between light, sweet crude and stuff that more commonly looks like solid rock. Don't worry, another couple years hanging around peakers and you won't even know that natural gas can be turned into syncrude and used to fuel airplanes.

But they are drilling the Bakken, have completely reversed another Hubbertian decline at the state level, whether that news has traveled down to Houston or not is mostly irrelevant, its not like their history goes back that far with oil production. Now, Parkersburg, West Virginia...THATS an oil town.

The stuff Oily is talking about is more likely to resemble the heavy oils of California, the Ugnu and West Sak formations are estimated to have more oil than Prudhoe Bay ( I didn't see the Lisburne Pool mentioned in Oilys article, maybe I missed it?), although technically some of the West Sak is inside Prudhoe Bay area and has its own field names now I believe, Polaris and Orion? But don't worry, Texas hasn't meant much in the oil world since 1930 and East Texas, you guys are old news. Alaska is where all the US action is going to be. Unless you guys are going to start developing some of those offshore hydrates of yours? Now THAT could be some action.

[TheDude]

A company with millions in cap and they don't have a website? Interesting idea, they can reuse old drilling pads and other infrastructure so that's a plus. But it's still a hellacious expensive environment to work in.

I checked out some of the seismic logs for NPR-A on a pdf I downloaded a long time ago - not all of those wells penetrated these formations in the first place, which makes sense since why drill into lower bearing source rock? This would add the expense of lengthening them if somebody wanted to test out the formation in the first place. Would be interesting to know how many wells had uneconomical shows. Meanwhile COP and company are fleeing the NPR-A in droves: Newest trend in NPR-A: 'We're outta here.' | TradingMarkets.com

[Xenophobe]

A company with millions in cap and they don't have a website? Interesting idea, they can reuse old drilling pads and other infrastructure so that's a plus. But it's still a hellacious expensive environment to work in.

You have no idea. Well, maybe you do, but I just found out recently, and was quite surprised.

There are other problems as well, one related to how these types of projects are funded. A time honored tradition in the oil industry is this thing called "promoting" someone into a well. Or project. You tell stories, you sing a song, you dance a jig, barbers and dentists, enthralled with your wild movements and enthusiasm, shower you with cash in the hopes of being in on the beginning of the next Standard Oil.

They still do this type of stuff today. Only time will tell because, upon occasion, things do work out. Not the creation of the next Standard Oil mind you, but successful projects and wells.

[copious.abundance]

A company with millions in cap and they don't have a website?

According to the articles, they just formed the company earlier this year, and they just raised their money a few months ago. Plus it's a private company. No doubt they'll eventually have a website, but right now they're in their infancy.

It also seems logical that a small company like this would partner with a bigger firm(s) to do most of the actual drilling work. Companies whose main modus operandi is to snap up land leases and then sell majority stakes to bigger companies who do the actual work are very common in the Bakken, so I wouldn't be surprised if this outfit is another one like that.

As for the well data, one of the articles said they'll be drilling a couple wells over the next several months, so I guess we'll find out more soon.

[Vogelzang]

Great news. Drill, Baby, drill! More.... more.....

[copious.abundance]

I have no idea if these guys are all talk and no money, or not, but they sure do have lots of ambition!

They also have quite a long-term plan, to put it mildly!

Great Bear raises eyebrows

• Great Bear’s current plan on its acreage calls for three 15-year phases. In each 15-year period 3,000 wells will be drilled from the same one-acre pads, at an average of 200 wells per year, requiring at least 20 drilling rigs working year-round. The cost for just the drilling, excluding pipelines, facilities, roads, etc. is $2 billion a year at approximately $10 million per well.

• If production begins in 2013 as planned, in a conservatively scaled project, Great Bear shows oil production from its acreage (see slide on page 10) alone at 200,000 barrels per day by 2020; 350,000 bpd by 2035; 450,000 bpd by 2041; peaking at 600,000 bpd in 2056, with a sustained long-term production of 450,000 barrels per day out as far as 2074.

• This kind of production, Duncan said, especially if other shale developers grab up the hundreds of thousands of acres left in these plays on the North Slope, might eventually necessitate a new pipeline to replace TAPS, or a sister line.