Trump puts the spotlight anew on a major Alaska gas project. Will it make a difference?

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — Since his election, President Donald Trump has repeatedly expressed support for a major natural gas pipeline in Alaska — comments that have drawn fresh attention to a project that’s floundered for years despite support from state leaders.

Trump mentioned the pipeline at a news conference with Japan’s prime minister earlier this month, drawing praise from Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy and U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan, both Republicans. As proposed, the nearly 810-mile (1,300-kilometer) pipeline would funnel gas from Alaska’s vast North Slope to port, with an eye largely on exports to Asian countries.

Critics, however, see this as a repackaged version of a decades-old effort that has struggled to gain traction. Hurdles include the cost — an estimated $44 billion for the pipeline and related infrastructure

— competition from other projects and questions about its economic feasibility. One state senator said Alaska has put around $1 billion over the years into trying to get a pipeline built.

Trump puts the spotlight anew on a major Alaska gas project. Will it make a difference?

The dumbest question ever asked? Of course it will make a huge difference. However, this is a long-run project and, unfortunately, the long run for a politician is their term of office. If Trump can streamline the permitting process thru the EPA, it could be done much more quickly than the first trans-Alaska pipeline.

It should be noted that there are truly huge quantities of methane hydrates under permafrost and the sea beds of Alaska.They dwarf the North Slope conventional deposits. The DOE did a successful teat in the 2010s to see if they could drill, depressurize and produce gas from permafrost methane hydrates it was successful. There is currently no way to move such gas to market. This pipeline would open not only the North Slope but also hydrates from permafrost as well. 44 billion is well around money compared to the value of those deposits.

There is LNG tech coming on line that makes it economical to go after remote stranded gas. Think shipping containers with the tech in inside them to make LNG liquid using only the gas itself as refrigerant and fuel for the process. You use 15-20% to turn it liquid and ship it out via trucks or rail in ISO containers that hold 47,000 liters of it, with a cold hold time of 90-120 days without venting. With active cold you have indefinite hold while using 0.5% per day after 90 days to run the cryocooler. Then you can ship them like any other ISO standard container via ,barge, ship,truck or rail no pipeline needed. This works for small fields or very remote stranded gas, the North Slope is iced in for much of the year so barge and ships without ice breakers is out, hence the pipeline south to a year round ice free port. Plus it is cheaper with large amounts of gas to gather it up pipeline it in gas form to one huge LNG plant and put it on huge oil tanker sized LNG ships to Asia. Why Asia only they can or will pay the $10 MMBTU costs for just turning it into LNG and shipping it the landed wholesale price with ROI is going to be $13+ MMBTU so it never will be competitive to Permian Basin Shale gas in the $4 range. That gas is and always will be for Japan,China and Korea unless for some reason in the future Permian gas runs low and prices get into the $13-15 range then it makes sense to ship it to a West coast port or run a pipeline through British Columbia to Washington State.

Alaska and northern Canada both have HUGE permafrost methane hydrate deposits. Until the testing done last decade it was not even a sure thing to get gas out of them. Geologists knew the deposits were there but no one anywhere proved you could drill into and produce gas from hydrates. That changed when we tested and the Japanese as well off shore. The danger is the stability curve is right up against the production curve one little F up and poof all the gas comes out at once and blows out not only the well but all the surrounding sediments as well. Needless to say done be around when that happens. Still Geos are pretty confident we can get at those with relative safety or automated systems such that you lose hardware not lives. The amounts are staggering world wide there is between 5000 and 10000 times as much fossilized carbon in hydrates as there is in all the other hydrocarbons combined including coal and Oil Shale not Shale Oil important difference. So much carbon you actually could change the gas balance of the atmosphere as in not ppm but percentages of co2 should you burn it all. Still a fraction of it could power the transition to nuclear everything over the next 50 years. Once you have fast spectrum nukes it’s foolish to use anything else for burning , you use it for plastics,chemicals,fertilizer, lubricants and medications not burning it once to the sky. Once humans unlocked the atom we can and should move away from burning crap to the sky we will all breathe better for it.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.