Oil seepages were noted in Alaska before the turn of the century. Exploration began as early as 1902 with the drilling of shallow wells near these seepages in the Cold Bay area of the Alaska Peninsula. In that same year drilling in the Yakataga area by the Chilkat Oil Company resulted in the discovery of the Katella field. This was Alaska's first oil field; however, it only produced 154,000 barrels from 1902 to 1933 when the topping plant was destroyed by fire and the field abandoned.

Exploration was spasmodic until World War II. At that time the government spent 45 million dollars in exploration to develop oil in Naval Petroleum Reserve No. 4 on the Arctic North Slope. Seventy-five wells were drilled in the period 1945-1953. These wells resulted in the discovery of the Umiat oil field with reserves of approximately 70 million barrels. Several small gas fields also were found. These discoveries, though non-commercial in themselves, indicated to the industry that oil and gas could be found in the Arctic North Slope, one of the largest sedimentary basins in Alaska.

The real turning point in oil exploration in Alaska occurred in 1957 when the Richfield Oil Corporation discovered the Swanson River field. This field resulted from a seismic survey over a topographic high. Swanson River oil field has produced more than 60 million barrels of oil from 50 wells, and should recover more than 100 million additional barrels through pressure maintenance by gas injection which is presently underway.

The discovery of the Swanson River oil field began an extensive geophysical and exploratory effort on the Kenai Peninsula which still continues. By 1959 this effort had resulted in the discovery of the large Kenai gas field by Union Oil Company and Marathon, and several smaller gas fields. From 1959 until 1962 no other significant discoveries were made. It appeared that Swanson River oil field was a "freak" and that no additional oil would be found in the Cook Inlet. The industry, however, continued the search and was adventuresome enough to explore the cold waters of the Cook Inlet and to acquire leases there from the state of Alaska. In 1962 Pan American Petroleum, drilling one of these leases in the Cook Inlet, discovered the Middle Ground Shoals oil field. This field, which has mo e than 1,500 feet of effective pay, indicated that oil fields could be found with sufficiently large reserves to justify the costly offshore operations in Alaska.

Industry effort since 1962 has resulted in the discovery of several large oil and gas fields, and has proved this to be one of the important oil-producing provinces of the United States. In addition to the Middle Ground Shoals field, major oil accumulations have been found recently in the McArthur River, Trading Bay, West Foreland, North Redoubt, Granite Point, and Tyonek areas. Most of these discoveries are from thick pay sections. In addition to the Lower Kenai Hemlock conglomeratic sandstone, saturation has been found in multiple pay zones of the Middle Kenai Formation which have better reservoir qualities than the Hemlock. All oil fields found in the Cook Inlet basin are undersaturated. Therefore, for maximum recovery, pressure maintenance will be required.

Reserves in excess of 1 billion barrels of oil and 4 trillion cubic feet of gas have been discovered in the Cook Inlet basin. The climatic, logistic, and tide problems make the Cook Inlet basin one of the most expensive operating areas in the world. Drilling costs are high because of the need for expensive platforms designed to withstand the forces of ice and tide plus the tremendous amount of directional work, submarine pipelines, docks, terminals, and other facilities necessary for the production of crude oil in a remote area. The industry, undaunted by the complexity and expense of the problems, continues to regard Alaska as an area with good profit potential. Here the possibility still exists of finding large reserves in the United States.

The Cook Inlet basin north of the Forelands has by now been explored relatively intensely, and the land is tightly leased. No company is interested in giving up any part of its acreage that is still unexplored. The industry as a whole, especially those companies that were not fortunate enough to acquire positions in the upper Cook Inlet, is looking expectantly and hopefully

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to the opening of the lower Cook Inlet by the Federal government for leasing, probably sometime in 1968. The areas of prime interest in Alaska today, and probably for the next few years, are lower Cook Inlet, Arctic North Slope, Bristol Bay, and Gulf of Alaska. It is interesting to note that 21 companies participated in a geophysical survey of Bristol Bay in 1966 and 20 companies participated in another survey in the Gulf of Alaska also in 1966. More and more, industry is finding that it behooves companies to join, where possible, to reduce the extremely high costs of operating in these areas. Alaska should continue for many years to be one of the important oil exploration areas in the United States.

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