Oliktok Pipeline was temporary shut-down

Oliktok Pipeline Co. wants to temporarily suspend service on the Oliktok Pipeline.

The ConocoPhillips Co. transportation subsidiary asked state regulators earlier this year for permission to discontinue operations on the North Slope pipeline through 2017.

The company made the request after ConocoPhillips Alaska Inc. announced late last year that it would stop shipping natural gas through the pipeline for the immediate future.

The Oliktok Pipeline connects the Prudhoe Bay unit to the Kuparuk River unit, with a connection at the Milne Point unit. The pipeline is certificated to carry either natural gas or natural gas liquids, although natural gas liquids shipments were discontinued in 2014.

The pipeline has not shipped any gas to the Milne Point unit since 2002. “Put simply, there is no current need for natural gas transportation service on the Oliktok Pipeline,” the company wrote in a Feb. 2 application to the Regulatory Commission of Alaska.

Oliktok Pipeline Co. said it would continue normal “surveillance, monitoring, and maintenance” during the suspension and would be prepared to restart shipments within 10 days notice. The suspension would extend to ratemaking and depreciation calculations.

Since ConocoPhillips ended actual gas shipments in late December 2016, the Oliktok Pipeline has been “blocked in at Skid 50, de-pressurized to 430 psig, and flow to KRU Central Processing Facility CPF-1 was discontinued,” according to the company.

Toward the end of last year, Oliktok Pipeline Co. proposed a major rate increase for the pipeline, based on a sharp decline in service in 2016 compared to forecasted volumes.

- ERIC LIDJI