State’s in-state gas efforts reorganized

House Bill 369, reorganizing the state’s in-state gas pipeline efforts, passed April 18 and went to the governor April 21. The most recent fiscal note for the bill is for $15.64 million in fiscal year 2011.

Under the bill, sponsored by House Speaker Mike Chenault, R-Nikiski, the Alaska Housing Finance Corp. will create a subsidiary for the in-state gas pipeline project team. The goal of this work is to submit an in-state natural gas pipeline plan to the Legislature by July 1, 2011. A cost of transportation estimate — providing pipeline and facility costs — is scheduled to be completed by July 1, 2010.

“We have spent enough money and enough time studying the in-state gasline; enough is enough,” Chenault said in a statement after the bill passed. “We have to get the idea off of high-center.”

Chenault said the bill identifies a group under the leadership of AHFC CEO Dan Fauske “to focus on financing and planning. We believe that with clear directives and timelines we can unify all the different state agency players to deliver a plan.”

The bill establishes the Joint In-State Gasline Development Team within AHFC. Members are the commissioner of the Department of Transportation and Public Facilities or the commissioner’s designee; the chair of the board of directors of the Alaska Railroad Corp.; the chief executive officer of the Alaska Natural Gas Development Authority; the in-state gasline project coordinator; and the executive director of AHFC, who is the chair of the development team.

The bill rolled in elements of HB 44, also a Chenault bill, which gives ANGDA the ability to work on in-state gas projects other than North Slope to Valdez and Southcentral.

The Senate Finance version of the bill which passed dropped $250 million in bonding authority for ANGDA which had been a part of the bill. The bonding authority was “to acquire a gas supply, develop the Cook Inlet and Fairbanks markets, and plan, permit, and design gas transmission systems to mitigate gas shortfalls, the effect on consumers, and the economy of high cost energy, and ensure energy efficiency for Alaskans.”

—Kristen Nelson