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Chretien favors Mackenzie Valley route for Arctic gas
Gary Park
An open microphone in Genoa, Italy, and a Coast Guard ship in the Beaufort Sea have undone Canada’s attempts to stay neutral on Arctic pipeline options, showing that the federal government is leaning heavily towards a Mackenzie Valley route.
Captured by television microphones at the Group of Eight summit in Italy, Prime Minister Jean Chretien was overheard telling President George W. Bush that “one pipeline could save a lot of money.”
Bush responded: “There’s only so much capital.”
Pressured to explain his remarks later, Chretien said there is “no doubt about it that there will be a pipeline in the Mackenzie Valley. It’s the only way you can get gas from the Delta down to the market. There is no other way. There will be a pipeline there.”
He did not say that would automatically lead to Canadian support for the hotly contested “over-the-top” option, although he did indicate a clear preference for a single pipeline to tap the North Slope and Mackenzie Delta.
But Chretien admitted to being caught off guard when Bush raised the possibility of an alternative to the “over-the-top” and Alaska Highway proposals, assumed by observers to be LNG shipments from Alaska to the Lower 48.
He said Bush “mentioned to me that there was a third idea coming up and I have never heard of it. So I said: ‘Wait a minute. We have already two (proposed) projects and if we had only one pipeline it’s easier than two.” Chretien wants to get Delta gas to market Chretien left no question that his government is determined to get Delta gas to market “as quickly as possible,” reinforcing the concerns of the Northwest Territories government that if the Alaska Highway proceeds as a stand-alone pipeline from the North Slope, Delta gas could be stranded indefinitely.
He said gas “owned and managed” by Canadian aboriginals “should not have to wait years to get to market.”
Northwest Territories Finance Minister Joe Handley was elated by Chretien’s comments, saying it’s now clear the prime minister endorses an all-Canadian line ahead of the Alaska Highway line.
“He’s supporting a Mackenzie Valley pipeline. There’s no other way of reading it. He’s supporting the over-the-top route for the Alaska gas.”
But Yukon premier Pat Duncan, a staunch ally of Alaska Gov. Tony Knowles, in favoring the Alaska Highway option, said she doesn’t believe Chretien has played favorites.
“I don’t ready that into the prime minister’s comments at all,” she said. “The prime minister is very well aware of the Yukon and the Yukon’s potential.”
Scientists studying Canadian Beaufort Sea Meanwhile, in a surprise move, welcomed by Northwest Territories Premier Stephen Kakfwi as further proof of government backing for the Mackenzie Valley, Canadian scientists are starting the first study in 20 years of Beaufort Sea ice conditions and the risks of placing a pipeline under the sea.
Canadian Coast Guard ship Nahidik is scheduled to sail July 30 and spend three weeks in waters between Herschel Island, near the Alaska-Northwest Territories border, and Tuktoyaktuk, on the eastern side of the Mackenzie Delta.
A spokesman for the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans said the environmental studies are prompted by a surge of interest in the impact of climate change and the prospect of oil and gas development in the Arctic.
He said the summer studies will be the first in a multi-year undertaking, although some data should be available by spring 2002.
Before engineers can design an undersea pipeline they need more information about the sea bed, including how thick the ice gets and how deeply it scours the floor of the Beaufort. Opponents fear line rupture Opponents of an “over-the-top” pipeline, promoted by Houston-based Arctic Resources, have made one of their strongest arguments around the dangers of a pipeline rupture, especially during winter when it might be impossible to repair.
The Fisheries and Oceans spokesman said the research will allow scientists to test a new multi-beam sonar that they hope will illuminate the sea bottom in greater detail than ever before.
The last research of a possible pipeline route dates from the 1970s and early 1980s, when gas producers shelved plans for developing the Arctic during a price downturn.
At that time scientists found a shallow coastal shelf between about 16 feet and 200 feet deep, stretching for several miles from the coastline and with a generally sandy and silty bottom.
Kakfwi said the new research is a sign of Canadian government support for the Mackenzie Valley pipeline.
“They’re checking it out, is my sense,” he told the Canadian Press news agency. “They don’t want to look like they’re committed, but they’re very interested in supporting a Mackenzie Valley route.”
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