Alaska’s Willow project faces regulatory uncertainty

Even a completed environmental assessment might not guarantee progress

The US Bureau of Land Management (BLM) published its final Supplemental Environmental Impact Assessment (SEIS) for ConocoPhillips’ Willow oil project in early February. The assessment identified a preference for “Alternative E”, comprising a scaled-back development option with three drill sites and the potential for a fourth. But the future of the project in the federally owned and managed National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) remains in doubt, even with Alaskan state officials sending letters of support to the BLM in recent months. “We are awaiting the final Record of Decision [ROD] following the SEIS,” Mark Oberstoetter, head of Americas non-L48 upstream research at Edinburgh-based con