Hilcorp Alaska gets approval for 40 Prudhoe Bay sidetrack wells

The next round of Prudhoe Bay work is aimed at squeezing more oil out of one of Alaska’s oldest and most important fields, with 40 sidetrack wells and facility upgrades now approved under Hilcorp Alaska’s 2026 development plan.

For North Slope Borough, that means the field is still a live industrial engine, not a slow wind-down. Sidetracks let drillers branch from existing wellbores into parts of the reservoir that have not been fully drained, a method that can extend production with less new surface disturbance than building fresh pads. In practical terms, the plan points to more rig activity, more contractor demand, and more traffic across the industrial corridor around Prudhoe Bay as Hilcorp North Slope and other working interest owners carry out the work.

That matters because Prudhoe is no ordinary field. Discovered on March 12, 1968, by ARCO and Exxon at the Prudhoe Bay State No. 1 well, it remains the largest oil field in North America. The field originally held about 25 billion barrels of oil in place, and more than 13 billion barrels are still considered recoverable with current technology. Those numbers explain why incremental projects at Prudhoe can still move the needle for state royalties, borough revenue, and the long-term use of support infrastructure on the Slope.

The approval also fits into a much larger system built around the field. The Trans Alaska Pipeline System runs 800 miles from Prudhoe Bay to Valdez, first carried oil in June 1977, and was completed in May 1977. Alyeska Pipeline Service Company said the line moved its 19 billionth barrel in 2025. Every additional barrel that Prudhoe can produce helps keep that pipeline fuller, which remains central to Alaska’s oil economy.

Prudhoe Bay itself has changed hands, but the operating logic has not. The unit was formed in 1977. Hilcorp Alaska took over as operator in 2020 after BP completed the sale of its upstream Alaska business, a transaction that included 176 oil and gas leases and more than 250 surface use permits tied to Prudhoe Bay, Point Thomson and Milne Point. In 2022, the Division of Oil and Gas described the Prudhoe Bay unit as 254,235 acres, with ownership shared among Hilcorp North Slope, ExxonMobil Alaska Production, ConocoPhillips Alaska and Chevron.

Hilcorp says it works with more than 700 Alaska small businesses, service providers and vendors and spends more than $750 million with them each year, which gives the new plan a clear local economic dimension. More field work can mean more jobs and more contracting opportunities, but it also brings added pressure on roads, work camps and aviation, along with the safety risks that come with steady industrial movement in a subsistence region.

The state also has a separate public notice open for a west-northwest expansion application at Prudhoe Bay, while Hilcorp has been pursuing other Prudhoe-area development actions, including the Omega Pad plan to reach oil in the Schrader Bluff Reservoir. Taken together, the approvals show a company working to prolong Prudhoe’s life well beyond the familiar image of a mature field.