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Cook Inlet touted for pipeline terminus Mat-Su Borough sees industrial, other advantages in routing large volumes of North Slope natural gas to state’s population center Wesley Loy For Petroleum News
If a North Slope pipeline is built south to tidewater to support liquefied natural gas exports, the “optimal tidewater” is Cook Inlet, officials of one local government say.
The Matanuska-Susitna Borough recently passed a resolution encouraging Gov. Sean Parnell and the Alaska Legislature to route the pipeline to the inlet.
The resolution demonstrates regional competition within the state for the gas line.
Most often, Valdez at Prince William Sound has been mentioned as the southern terminus of a gas line. That city already is the end point for the 800-mile trans-Alaska oil pipeline.
Value-added vision The Matanuska-Susitna Borough, known as Mat-Su for short, has been the state’s fastest growing area.
With an area greater than the state of West Virginia, the borough takes in the towns of Wasilla and Palmer as well as northern Cook Inlet waters. It is developing a seaport at Point MacKenzie, on the opposite shore from Anchorage.
The borough’s Jan. 17 resolution notes that its port, with the planned construction of a railroad connection, “will attract high volumes of natural resources that could be further developed prior to export from our deep water port given a source of cheap energy.”
That cheap energy is abundant North Slope natural gas, which if piped to Cook Inlet could not only serve the state’s population center but also “spur a new generation of industry,” Mat-Su Borough Mayor Larry DeVilbiss said in a Feb. 8 press release.
The borough says its port development has 14 square miles of industrial space for value-added processing of natural resources.
The borough resolution mentions Donlin Creek, a huge gold mining project proposed in remote Western Alaska.
“The Donlin Creek mine project is poised to invest approximately $1 billion into a gas line from the Cook Inlet gas infrastructure to the Bethel region,” the borough press release said.
Two gas lines For decades, cheap and abundant Cook Inlet gas has heated Southcentral Alaska and provided fuel for electricity generation.
But inlet gas production is running down, and meeting peak winter demand is getting tougher.
State political leaders and economic boosters long have pursued a large-diameter pipeline to carry the North Slope’s enormous stranded gas reserves to market. Such a project would mean jobs and a major new stream of tax revenue for the state.
At the moment, one such project is on the table — a partnership between TransCanada and ExxonMobil, one of the major North Slope gas owners.
The project focus mainly has been on building the pipeline through Canada. But recently, prospects for the line have dimmed with the rise of new gas supplies in the Lower 48.
The governor has suggested a better option might be piping North Slope gas to Alaska’s southern tidewater for LNG shipments to Asia, and he’s pushing the various players to study the idea.
A state agency also is planning a smaller diameter pipeline, known as the Alaska Stand Alone Pipeline or ASAP. This 737-mile buried pipeline would bring North Slope gas to Cook Inlet to supply local needs.
Consolidate projects The Mat-Su Borough’s resolution suggests “combining the concepts” of the large and small pipelines to deliver high volumes of gas to Cook Inlet.
The resolution says the cost of the ASAP project might result in gas costing as much or more than LNG imported into Alaska, which is one alternative that’s been mentioned to deal with declining Cook Inlet gas production.
A high-volume pipeline, routed to tidewater at Cook Inlet, could serve more than half the state’s population, support industrial activity and eliminate the need to import gas, the resolution says.
The difficulty with any North Slope gas line project, however, isn’t choosing a route or deciding where to locate its southern terminus. It’s the multibillion-dollar cost of the projects, and the enormous investment risk involved. That’s why many years of political and corporate deliberation have yet to yield a gas line.
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