ConocoPhillips Will Develop the Nuna Project in Northern Alaska
Greater Kuparuk Area in northern Alaska. ConocoPhillips is Alaska’s largest crude oil producer and ConocoPhillips Alaska operates the Kuparuk River Unit. (Photo: ConocoPhillips Company).
ConocoPhillips Alaska has announced that funding has been approved for developing the Nuna project on Alaska's North Slope. The company notes that it will continue to invest about $1 billion a year to grow its Alaska legacy business with projects such as Nuna.
ConocoPhillips Alaska is to develop a new oil field; the Nuna Project at Kuparuk 3T Drillsite.
The company recently announced in a press release that funding has been approved for developing the project located in the Kuparuk River Unit.
ConocoPhillips operates the Kuparuk River Unit on Alaska's North Slope, in the northernmost parts of the state. This onshore producing field is one of North America’s largest oil field and lies 40 miles west of Prudhoe Bay.
Project construction activities will begin this year and continue in 2024 with pipeline and on-pad construction, the company writes. Drilling is anticipated to begin in late 2024 with first oil anticipated by early 2025, with an expected peak oil rate of 20,000 barrels of oil per day (BOPD).
“The additional drilling opportunities we’ve identified at Nuna are a positive development that should increase oil production at Kuparuk,” says President Erec Isaacson of ConocoPhillips Alaska.
“Our investment in this project was approved due to Alaska’s stable fiscal regime which is clearly working to promote new and ongoing investment,” he adds.
ConocoPhillips Alaska states that it will continue to invest about $1 billion a year to grow its Alaska legacy business with projects such as Nuna.
The company acquired the Nuna acreage in 2019 from Caelus, who had already constructed the gravel road and pad for drillsite 3T.
The Kuparuk oil field was discovered in 1969 and production began in 1981. Kuparuk reached a milestone in July 2005 when cumulative production reached 2 billion barrels, and has produced over 2.5 billion barrels to date, ConocoPhillips notes.