ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Legal Newsline) – ConocoPhillips Alaska is facing a motion to dismiss a lawsuit it filed earlier this year that seeks to block the release of information it gathered while drilling the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska.
The Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission has that information and feels it is entitled to release it, a June 24 motion to dismiss the lawsuit says. Nothing in the federal Naval Petroleum Reserve Protection Act of 1976 preempts the state law that mandates disclosing the info to the public, the motion says.
The Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Act came before (in 1955) the federal NPRPA (1976), the motion notes, and has historically allowed the state to exercise authority over all land in Alaska subject to its police powers, including “land of the United States and land subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.”
“Thus,” it adds, “the Court must presume that Congress did not intend to supersede the historic police powers of the states to regulate oil and gas production and conservation unless that was the ‘clear and manifest’ purpose of Congress.”
ConocoPhillips is hoping to prevent the spread of corporate data collected while drilling wells in the reserve. AOGCC can release it after the wells are completed.
The lawsuit hopes to extend that timeframe to protect the tens of millions of dollars ConocoPhillips has spent.
"CPAI made these investments based on the federal government's express confirmation that the highly valuable data obtained from this exploratory work would be held confidentially for the duration of CPAI's leases, thus preventing competitors from taking unfair advantage of CPAI's efforts," the complaint says.
"In addition to the federal government's express assurances of confidentiality, CPAI is entitled to confidential treatment of this well data pursuant to federal law."
The reserve consists of close to 24 million acres on Alaska's North Slope and is the country's largest single unit of public land, the suit says. CPAI began exploring and drilling wells in response after legislation passed more than 30 years ago that included a confidentiality provision for any company that obtained a lease to drill, the suit says.
It has made disclosures to the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission that, under a state law, can release the information now. The data is 24 months old, and 30 days have gone by since completion of wells.
ConocoPhillips wants to use a provision in state law that allows an extension if the "commissioner of natural resources finds that the required reports and information contain significant information relating to the valuation of unleased land in the same vicinity."