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Gov. Dunleavy led CERAWeek delegation
Kristen Nelson Petroleum News
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy led a small state delegation to CERAWeek 2019 in Houston the week of March 11.
“Alaska represents one of the safest, most predictable and most prolific targets for energy development in the world, and there is no more important place to deliver that message than at CERAWeek,” Dunleavy said in a March 8 statement.
He said members of the state team would be “meeting with the heavy hitters - executives, marketers, investors and financiers - to strongly highlight Alaska’s energy potential and help drive home new investments.”
Dunleavy said he told Alaskans in his state of the state address that “we would be going out and marketing Alaska to the world.” The trip to CERAWeek, he said, is “part of that mission - to put Alaska back on the global radar. To share the message that Alaska is open for business and we are one of the strongest energy plays in the world.”
CERAWeek interviews The governor did two interviews as part of CERAWeek, first with Atul Arya, senior vice president and chief energy strategist for IHS Markit and then a more extensive interview with Dr. Daniel Yergin, vice chairman of IHS Markit.
Dunleavy told Arya the state was willing to sit down and work with investors, with companies willing to come to Alaska, and said the state would assist with permitting.
Alaska should be viewed as a real player, Dunleavy told Arya, and said his administration’s goal is to provide a stable environment. Costs may be higher in Alaska, he said, but risks are lower, with infrastructure and policies in place. And because the Alaska resource is conventional, it’s an opportunity for companies to balance the shale in their portfolios.
Dunleavy told Arya that Alaska is awash in gas and said the administration is still examining the possibility of the gas line, working through to see if it’s economic, something that should be known within 60 days.
He told Yergin he thinks Alaska’s oil production will go back up, due to some exciting discoveries in the last few years. From a high of 2 million barrels per day, North Slope production has dropped to some 500,000 bpd, the governor said, but with discoveries the state is anticipating bringing on some 200,000 bpd of new oil.
Dunleavy told Yergin the Alaska Gasline Development Corp. is working on ways to monetize North Slope gas and get it to market but said that project was challenged.
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