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State issues RFP for Umiat EIS DOT&PF plans to spend at least $1 million on three-year environmental document crucial for construction major roadway project Eric Lidji For Petroleum News
On the heels of a budgetary boost this spring, the State of Alaska is now looking for a company to put together an environment impact statement for a proposed road to Umiat.
The Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities put out a request for proposals on Oct. 4 for a third party to analyze a proposed “all-season gravel road, oil and gas pipelines, and related infrastructure” from some point along the Dalton Highway to Umiat. The state plans to spend at least $1 million on the crucial permitting document.
The contract would run from December 2010 to December 2013.
The state will accept proposals through Oct. 25.
The RFP is an attempt to get out ahead of the permitting process.
DOT&PF previously asked the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to review “preliminary wetland and other data to determine appropriate levels of environmental documentation necessary for project permitting,” according to the department. If the project warrants an EIS, DOT&PF expect the Corps to be the lead federal agency for the National Environmental Policy Act process.
Project gaining momentum Western Alaska is believed to contain numerous deposits of oil and natural gas that might be economic in parts of the world with wider infrastructure networks, but have gone undeveloped for decades because their remoteness makes them too expensive to pursue.
Policymakers have long dreamed about a road to Umiat as a way to open up those western reaches of the state, including the foothills of the Brooks Range and sections of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. Those dreams took steps toward reality with the creation of the Roads to Resources program, but never took off.
The Palin and Parnell administrations, though, took interest in the project, largely to increase access to natural gas fields that could one day fill a proposed natural gas pipeline from the North Slope to southern markets, a major goal of both administrations.
Earlier this year, the Alaska Legislature and the Parnell administration approved $13 million in Roads to Resources funding, including an $8 million appropriation for environmental work on the so-called “Foothills West Transportation Access” project.
Fieldwork conducted Over the past two years, state crews have conducted fieldwork in that region. A May 2010 analysis of five possible routes currently favors the Galbraith Route, which would run 102 miles from milepost 278 of the Dalton Highway to the Umiat airstrip.
That route would traverse state, federal and Native land, which may be of benefit.
The May 2010 analysis noted that under the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, Arctic Slope Region Corp. is allowed to establish a pipeline right of way through some of the region. It also noted, “If the State and ASRC agree on a utility corridor for the proposed first 10 miles of the Galbraith Route, a ROW could be established without requiring Bureau of Land Management environmental documentation.”
The proposed road and pipeline corridor would significantly bring down costs for two current exploration projects in the region: Anadarko Petroleum’s search for natural gas in the Gubik Complex and Renaissance Alaska’s search for oil at the Umiat field.
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