APA Expands Alaska Footprint with Savant Acquisition

APA Corp has signed a deal to take over Savant Alaska LLC, which owns upstream and midstream oil assets, for an initial payment of $70 million.

The transaction gives Houston, Texas-based APA about 17,000 net acres in the Badami Unit on Alaska's North Slope, where the company already owns 163,000 net acres. The Savant acreage currently produces around 1,500 net barrels per day (bpd) of oil, APA said in a press release.

"The transaction includes the Badami facilities, which have nameplate production capacity of approximately 40,000 barrels of oil per day, along with extensive supporting infrastructure, including accommodation facilities, a grind-and-inject system, barge landing and wharf facilities, runway access, gravel resources and other field infrastructure", APA said.

"The transaction also includes approximately 75,000 net acres in the Grey Owl unit, and additional non-unitized acreage adjacent to Badami, providing further exploration upside", APA said.

"Following the acquisition, APA's position on Alaska's eastern North Slope will total approximately 487,000 gross acres".    

The transaction also gives APA the Nutaaq Pipeline, which carries up to about 80,000 bpd of oil from Badami and connects to the 800-mile Trans-Alaska Pipeline System, which runs from Prudhoe Bay to the port of Valdez.

APA expects to complete the transaction by yearend, subject to regulatory approval and other closing conditions.

Besides the initial payment, APA said it owes "additional contingent payments tied to future development of APA's eastern North Slope position".

APA chief executive John J. Christmann IV said, "The acquisition of Savant secures control of strategic infrastructure adjacent to our eastern North Slope acreage, enhancing our ability to execute our planned drilling program efficiently. As we continue to appraise and de-risk our resource base, ownership of this infrastructure provides greater flexibility and optionality in future development planning and represents a key step toward unlocking the potential of our position in Alaska".

"Several infrastructure assets, including accommodation facilities, the grind-and-inject system, barge landing and associated field infrastructure, are expected to support operations beginning with the 2026-2027 winter drilling season", APA added.

"APA has assumed operatorship of the existing joint venture with partners Lagniappe Alaska LLC, an Armstrong company, and Oil Search (Alaska) LLC, a subsidiary of Santos Limited, and plans to conduct a two-well drilling program during the 2026-2027 winter season, consisting of one exploration well and one appraisal well. The exploration well will test a new play in the western portion of the acreage.

"Results from the appraisal well will help define the scale of the Sockeye complex, support development planning, and assess the feasibility of utilizing existing Badami infrastructure".

Last year APA and its partners declared a "significant" petroleum discovery in the Lagniappe area on the North Slope.

Drilled to about 10,500 feet, the Sockeye-2 well “encountered a high-quality reservoir with approximately 25 feet of net oil pay in one blocky, Paleocene-aged sand with an average porosity of 20 percent", APA announced March 17, 2025.

The discovery averaged 2,700 bpd of oil "during the final flow period [of a 12-day test] without artificial lift", APA said in a media release April 24, 2025. "The results of the flow test indicate significantly higher reservoir quality compared to similar topset discoveries to the west.

"Further appraisal drilling will determine the ultimate size of the discovery, but the flow test demonstrates the exceptional productivity of this shallow-marine reservoir".

APA holds a 50 percent stake in the leasehold through subsidiary Apache Corp. Operator Lagniappe Alaska of Armstrong Oil & Gas Inc owns 25 percent. Santos has the remaining 25 percent.

Sockeye-2 is the second successful exploratory well drilled by the consortium on their 325,411-acre position on state lands. The first discovery, King Street-1, struck oil in two Brookian zones.

"The Sockeye-2 well further demonstrates the potential of the play, presenting an exciting opportunity in an active area of the North Slope with significant existing infrastructure", commented Armstrong CEO Bill Armstrong.

The leasehold sits east of Prudhoe Bay, one of the biggest oilfields in the United States.

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