Malcolm Gorrill
Northern News Services

Lucas Point (Oct 06/00) - Location is crucial. That's the message delivered by Jim Guthrie, president of Arctic Oil and Gas Services Ltd. (AOGS).

Guthrie took part in a meeting last week at Ingamo Hall on his company's proposal to redevelop the Lucas Point Camp. If approved, construction of the two-storey camp, capable of housing 100 people, would begin early next year.

The site would be used as a base camp for Chevron Canada Resources.

After the meeting, which was attended by about 50 people, Guthrie explained the closer a base camp is to the drilling site, the better.

"There are no roads out there, no year round roads, and a very short drilling season," Guthrie said.

"By having a base camp on the Mackenzie River, and then on the right side of the river, depending on where they're drilling, they then can start to build ice roads on land much earlier to their operation than if they had to wait for the Mackenzie River to freeze up," he said.

"They would lose probably 30 days, and of course that could be 20 per cent of their drilling season," Guthrie said. "The base camp would be responsible for all the movement of men and materials to the exploration sites."

Lucas Point is on Inuvialuit private lands on the east bank of the East Channel of the Mackenzie River. Previous camps were established there throughout the 1970s.

The area AOGS is proposing to develop is about 80 kilometres northwest of Inuvik, 10 kilometres southwest of Swimming Point, and eight kilometres northeast of Bar C.

The camp would cover 4.6 hectares.

Materials and equipment will be transported to Lucas Point by the Inuvik to Tuktoyaktuk ice road in the winter and by barge in the summer.

Transportation on site will be limited to the gravel pad. Gravel will be hauled to the site from the nearest source, which will likely be Ya Ya Lakes.

The AOGS proposal is under an environmental review.

"I would like to think we could get through the process by November to December," Guthrie said.

"We would haul some gravel in January and February. But we have right until spring break to haul the gravel. So as long as we can get approval so that we can haul the gravel before the ice roads go out, say mid-April, we're fine."