Aboriginals get gas line funding

Gary Park, Petroleum News Calgary correspondent

The Canadian government will provide C$10.9 million over the next six years to support aboriginal participation in the proposed Mackenzie Valley natural gas pipeline.

The Northwest Territories government will contribute another C$1.5 million, with additional industry and aboriginal contributions building the fund to C$16 million.

The money will be used to hire five full-time staff, including consultants and industry experts and allow the Aboriginal Pipeline Group to open offices in Calgary and the Mackenzie Valley. Indian Affairs and Northern Development Minister Robert Nault said Aug. 22 that the funding establishes “how we will do business and develop an economy for and with aboriginal people.”

Among the challenges it now faces, the Aboriginal Pipeline Group must secure independent gas supply sources in the Mackenzie Delta region of up to 400 million cubic feet per day to help it secure debt financing of C$700 million-$800 million to lock up a one-third equity position in the pipeline.

It also has plans in the works to train aboriginals to benefit from pipeline work.

“The Aboriginal Pipeline Group will have the financial and professional resources to make (the pipeline) real,” said Fred Carmichael, chairman of the group and president of the Gwich’in Tribal Council.