The Canadian government believes the Mackenzie Gas Project will proceed, despite rising costs and unresolved negotiations on fiscal terms, said Jim Prentice, the federal cabinet minister assigned to the Mackenzie portfolio.
He told Reuters in an interview yesterday that his optimism is based on the fact that “a lot of the work (on the regulatory front) that needed to be done has now been done.”
Prentice, currently environment minister, said he now expects to receive a long-delayed final report from a Joint Review Panel, assigned to deal with the environmental and social aspects of a pipeline from the Mackenzie Delta to southern markets, between March and May of 2009, at least six months behind the most recent schedule.
Pending completion of the panel’s environmental work, he said “the fiscal framework continues to be an outstanding issue.”
But Prentice estimates the Mackenzie project is currently about five or six years ahead of a proposed gas pipeline from Alaska’s North Slope to the Lower 48, wider than the two-year gap projected in 2005.
See full story in Dec. 7 issue of Petroleum News, available to subscribers online at noon Friday, Dec. 5 at www.PetroleumNews.com
no scientific or legal reason to continue the ban on drilling in the area, Neufeld said there was “much more work to be done before any decision to allow exploration or development can proceed.”
But he emphasized that an offshore industry would create “enormous economic benefits” for British Columbians, especially northern communities and First Nations.
