State officials say Wednesday’s Cook Inlet oil and gas lease sale netted more than $6.8 million. Preliminary results indicate the sale is the second largest in Cook Inlet in a dozen years. Bill Barron, state Department of Natural Resources oil, says an gas division director, says five groups bid on 44 tracts.
The three primary bidders at today’s sale were Apache, Cook Inlet Energy, and a new player in Cook Inlet, Hillcorp.
Barron says the increased interest in Cook Inlet resources could be attributed to Apache’s earlier exploration efforts
State tax incentives have played a role in luring new development to the Inlet. There’s no tax on Cook Inlet oil production. Producers do pay a 5 percent royalty on new discoveries for the first 10 years. Barron says after today’s lease sale, it takes about a year before exploration can begin.
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APTI Reporter-Producer Ellen Lockyer started her radio career in the late 1980s, after a stint at bush Alaska weekly newspapers, the Copper Valley Views and the Cordova Times. When the Exxon Valdez ran aground in Prince William Sound, Valdez Public Radio station KCHU needed a reporter, and Ellen picked up the microphone.
Since then, she has literally traveled the length of the state, from Attu to Eagle and from Barrow to Juneau, covering Alaska stories on the ground for the AK show, Alaska News Nightly, the Alaska Morning News and for Anchorage public radio station, KSKA
elockyer (at) alaskapublic (dot) org | 907.550.8446 | About Ellen
