The historic Teapot Dome Oilfield—also known as Naval Petroleum Reserve #3 (NPR3) and most recently as the Rocky Mountain Oilfield Testing Center (RMOTC) — will likely close as a U.S. Department of Energy facility. Budget restrictions have stopped using federal dollars to partially fund experimental projects, such as EGS drilling, at RMOTC and oil production doesn't pay the bills.
The field brings in about $4 million a year in revenues from oil sales and has two missions. First is oil production; the second is testing new equipment and techniques, such as use of the field's geothermal resources.
Teapot Dome is is unique because there are no spacing orders or communitization/unitization agreements. "Since the government owns everything within the 9,800 acres we can pretty much operate as we want, although we work closely with the Wyoming State Oil and Gas Conservation Commission," Clarke Turner, director of RMOTC said.
"We have a great geothermal resource — 190 degree water from the Ten Sleep Formation — that could be used in low temperature electrical generators to produce energy that could run some of the systems," Turner said.
