Anadarko is a worldwide natural gas production company with “almost 10 percent of its $6 billion company budget invested in the Uintah Basin,” Brad Miller, general manager of Anadarko’s Greater Natural Buttes gas field south of Vernal, said last week.

Miller spoke during a Vernal Chamber of Commerce luncheon on April 20.

According to the company’s fourth-quarter results, Anadarko’s Greater Natural Buttes gas field “set a daily sales record of 357 MMcf/d, which increased year-over-year sales volumes by approximately 17 percent in 2009.”

Miller said that translates into an economic benefit of “$27.4 million paid in taxes to the State of Utah and an additional $40 million in royalties in the past year.”

Part of these earnings come from five new rigs and 47 wells drilled in the fourth quarter, for a total of 153 wells drilled in the Greater Natural Buttes field in 2009.

“Greater Natural Buttes is the largest asset we have and a world-class asset,” says Miller. “On any given day, Anadarko has 180 direct employees and as many as 600 subcontractors working in the Vernal area.”

Sounds pretty good, but it could be better, Miller explained.

Anadarko projects that the resource-rich Greater Natural Buttes field could sustain infill drilling up to 500 wells a year, if an environmental impact statement (EIS) is completed.

That’s a big if, as the scope of the Anadarko proposal would drill up to “56 wells per section in an existing gas field of about about 180,000 acres,” said Miller.

Currently, the EIS sits in Washington, D.C., waiting for a mid-June expected release date for public comment.

“The timeline to complete an EIS is typically 60 months, which means we anticipate a May 2011 idealized completion,” Miller said of the federally mandated consultation process.

A drawback to its completion is the sheer scope of the proposed undertaking and its environmental impact, including both direct and indirect effects.

Anadarko, the manager said, is developing an environmental stewardship in the Greater Natural Buttes gas field EIS, perhaps as an early rejoinder to protests by conservation groups.

“We have worked closely with Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) in the past to minimize impacts and will do so in the future,” Miller said.

David Garbett, SUWA staff attorney, said, “We have no current agreement with Anadarko for the EIS. But, we have a continuing dialogue with the company and hope to expand on that in the future.”

Miller said the company’s environmental approach involves reduction in water use “by working to use more directional drilling, which reduces water use by 70 percent.”

Directional drilling means less surface disturbance, since the technique minimizes the ground space needed to develop natural gas resources by directionally drilling wells in clusters, where feasible. This also means reducing water use by 70 percent.

Utilizing recycled water is possible as more wells are drilled from a single pad. Residual in-field production water is then disposed of in injection wells. That means fewer water trucks hauling water shorter distances.

“These procedures have reduced truck traffic from 770 to 77 water haulers per four-well pad, saving some 30,000 miles of travel per pad or approximately 1.8 million miles per year,” said Miller, adding the net effect is improved air quality and reduced surface disturbance.

Miller added that areas of wildlife habitat and visual sensitivity that abut portions of the gas field that can avoided through the use of directional drilling.

Commencement of the public comment period for the Greater Natural Buttes EIS will be announced when the document is released.

— mbernard@vernal.com