Oil & Gas
Approved Willow Project Description
The Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management provided this description of the Willow Project in its Record of Decision, issued March 23, 2023:

The Project as approved in this Decision—Alternative E as described in the Final Supplemental EIS, as modified to include only drill sites BT1, BT2, and BT3 and associated infrastructure—will include the Willow Processing Facility (WPF), Willow Operations Center (WOC), airstrip, and three drill sites (BT1, BT2, and BT3). Gravel roads will connect to all Project infrastructure and will extend from the Greater Mooses Tooth 2 (GMT-2) development southwest toward the Project area. As approved in this Decision, the Project will include up to 199 total wells, four valve pads, three pipeline pads, five water source access pads, pipelines to support Project infrastructure, and up to three subsistence-use boat ramps. BT2 will be located north of Fish Creek to gain access to a portion of the target reservoir. The subsistence-use boat ramps were added to the Project by ConocoPhillips Alaska as mitigation to help offset Project effects on the community of Nuiqsut.

The access road alignment will provide direct gravel-road access from the existing gravel road network in the Greater Mooses Tooth (GMT) Unit and Alpine developments to the Project facilities. The full, all-season gravel road connection to Alpine will allow for additional operational safety and risk reduction by providing redundancies and additional contingencies for each development.

Ice roads will be used during Project construction to support gravel placement and pipeline construction, to access the gravel mine site, and to transport sealift modules from Oliktok Dock to the Project area. Separate ice roads will be used for pipeline construction, gravel placement, and general traffic to address safety considerations. A partially grounded ice bridge across the Colville River near Ocean Point will be used to transport sealift modules to the Willow area. The ice road will originate at the end of the existing Kuparuk road system at Kuparuk drill site 2P (DS2P).

Infield (multiphase) pipelines will connect individual drill sites to the WPF, and export/import pipelines will connect the WPF eastward to existing infrastructure on the North Slope. Diesel fuel will be piped from Kuparuk CPF2 to the Alpine Central Processing Facility and then trucked to the Project area.

The Project will include at least two Class I underground injection control disposal wells, both located at the WOC. The Project will use an existing mud plant located on the K-Pad, near Alpine CD5, to produce drilling mud, which eliminates the need to construct a new mud plant at the WOC. The existing K-Pad mud plant will be expanded on the existing gravel pad to support this use. The Project will also include installation of two additional modules on the existing GMT-2 drill site pad to allow for the possibility of transporting GMT-2 produced fluids westward to the WPF in case of future need.

Electrical power for the Project will be generated by a 98MW power plant at the WPF, equipped with natural gas-fired turbines. Power will be delivered to each drill site and the WOC via power cables suspended from pipeline horizontal support members.

Gravel will be primarily obtained from a new gravel mine site in the Tiŋmiaqsiuġvik area, approximately 4 to 5 miles southeast of GMT-1. The gravel mine site will be accessed seasonally via ice road; no permanent gravel road to the mine site will be constructed. There will be no activity at the mine site outside of the winter construction season. Small amounts of gravel will also be obtained from existing mine sites C and E in Kuparuk, to widen sections of existing Kuparuk roads that will be used for module transport.

Sealift module delivery will use the existing Oliktok Dock to receive the sealift barges. The modules will be transported over existing Kuparuk gravel roads using self-propelled module transporters from Oliktok Dock to Kuparuk DS2P. From Kuparuk DS2P, the modules will then be moved by heavy-haul ice roads to GMT-2, crossing the Colville River on a partially grounded ice bridge near Ocean Point. From GMT-2, the modules will be transported to the Project area over Project gravel roads to reach the WPF and drill site gravel pads.