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Murkowski places gas line amendments
Petroleum News
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee accepted provisions proposed by Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, to the Senate energy bill.
Murkowski, the ranking Republican on the energy committee, and Chairman Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., agreed to include the provisions in the base text of a comprehensive energy bill expected to pass the committee later in June, the senator’s office said in a June 6 statement.
The bill includes major changes to the federal loan guarantee program:
An increase in the 2004 loan guarantee amount from $18 billion to $30 billion, plus inflation;
Use of the Federal Financing Bank to capitalize the project to reduce administrative costs and interest rates, shrinking the overall cost of the pipeline by hundreds of millions of dollars;
Clarification of language Clarification of 2004 language to ensure the federal government provides 100 percent loan guarantee for up to 80 percent of the cost of the total project; and Technical amendments to the 2004 act to speed issuance of the loan guarantee.
“A gas line is absolutely essential for Alaska’s economic future,” Murkowski said in the statement. “These guarantees will ensure that the largest construction project in North America is able to move forward despite the current economic uncertainties.”
In addition to provisions for the main line, Murkowski won committee approval for a provision granting a right of way through Denali National Park and Preserve for a smaller in-state “bullet” line. The right-of-way provisions for a line along the Parks Highway clear a procedural problem and would allow fair competition between Parks Highway and Richardson-Glenn Highway routes, the senator’s office said.
Also included is language establishing a one-stop permitting office for energy production on Alaska’s outer continental shelf.
ANWR drilling rejected The senator did not fare so well with her efforts to allow horizontal directional drilling into the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The Associated Press reported that the energy committee rejected by a 10-13 vote a proposal by the senator to allow access to oil in ANWR by drilling for it from outside the refuge. Environmentalists, as well as many senators, argue that the refuge should be protected from drilling. Murkowski argued that so-called “directional drilling” from outside the refuge boundary would not disturb wildlife or the environment.
—The Associated Press contributed to this report
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