JPO accepts northeast ROW applications

Alan Bailey

The state and federal Joint Pipeline Office has accepted the Alaska Department of Natural Resources’ applications for rights of way for an oil pipeline and a gas pipeline between the Point Thompson area of the eastern North Slope and a location near Pump Station 1, at the northern end of the trans-Alaska pipeline. DNR submitted the applications on Sept. 19 and added some amendments on Feb. 3. JPO has now issued a public notice of the applications; comments are due within 60 days.

JPO has published the applications for public review at http://www.jpo.doi.gov/SPCO/SPCO.htm#ensoil.

In September the state said it had not decided whether to build the pipelines but that it was applying for the rights of way to expedite potential oil and gas development at the eastern end of the North Slope.

“We want to be ready if we do have an opportunity for development out there — future explorers working offshore or onshore will know they will have a pipeline they can tap into,” former DNR Deputy Commissioner Dick LeFebvre told Petroleum News at that time.

A company interested in building one or both of the lines could take over DNR’s rights of way to “build a regulated pipeline (common carrier line), one any company could use, which is what this pipeline would have to be,” LeFebvre said.

The pipelines proposed by the state would each be 45 miles in length and would occupy overlapping 700-foot wide rights of way on state lands. The oil pipeline would sit on vertical support members but the natural gas line might be buried for all or part of its length. In the absence of information on future oil and gas production from the eastern end of the North Slope DNR has not yet determined the diameters of the pipelines, but the pipelines need to be piggable and are not expected to carry more than 1 million barrels per day of oil and 2 billion standard cubic feet per day of natural gas, according to the applications.