NEWS FROM THE OFFICE OF FRANK MURKOWSKI

MURKOWSKI: NEW ESTIMATES SHOW ANWR BEST OIL PROSPECT; 3-D SEISMIC DATA MORE IMPORTANT THAN EVER

Washington -- While saying the estimates reinforce the belief that the Arctic coastal plain represents America's best chance for a major oil discovery, Alaska Sen. Frank Murkowski tonight said the latest data points out the need for new seismic testing, which likely will confirm even larger oil deposits in northern Alaska.

Murkowski, chairman of the Senate Energy Committee, was responding to the release of new petroleum estimates for the Arctic coastal plain by the U.S. Geological Survey. The findings, released tonight, predict that total oil in place on the North Slope ranges from 11.6 to 31.5 billion barrels, with their being a 95 percent change of 5.7 billion barrels being technically recoverable, with a 5 percent chance of 16 billion being recovered. The likely mean is 10.3 billion. The new estimates more than double the former estimates by the USGS from 1987. In ANWR proper the numbers range from 4.3 to 11.8 BBO.

"These numbers show once again that this area of Alaska is still the single best prospect in America to explore for oil - that would enable us to reduce our dependence on foreign sources. It certainly highlights that the three-day 'back-of-the-envelope' study lower estimates unveiled by the Secretary of Interior back in the summer of 1995 were, what we said then, nothing more than an attempt to support the Secretary's anti-development political agenda," said Murkowski.

He said the new estimates, two years in the making, are based on decades' old seismic data, "We have the technology now to get a more accurate picture of the slope's potential. All we need is the permission to collect enough new seismic data, which then can be analyzed using the new three-dimensional seismic processes. Even as huge as these estimates are, new data likely would raise them.

"USGS has good theoretical expertise, but their estimates are hamstrung by use of old data. You can now obtain detailed images of the subsurface geology with little or no impact on the environment, and we ought to do so," said Murkowski, who earlier this year announced his support for legislation permitting 3-D seismic testing of the coastal plain. Such testing would be identical to that allowed by the Department this winter on the Kenai Peninsula. Murkowski said technology has advanced so as to permit development of North Slope fields with little environmental effect.