Posted on 08/27/2006 6:27:08 AM PDT by thackney
Gasline Port Authority misleads Alaskans on several key issues
If you're negotiating to sell your house and have other legitimate offers, you can afford to take a tough bargaining stand. The same applies to the state's negotiations for a North Slope natural gas pipeline.
So Alaskans need to know the truth -- whether there is a viable option or merely a misleading dream -- as they consider a deal with the major North Slope oil and gas producers to build the pipeline.
The Alaska Gasline Port Authority is committed to its option -- a pipeline from Prudhoe Bay to Valdez, where an expensive plant would liquefy the gas for shipment aboard tankers to West Coast ports. The port authority is so devoted to its cause that it has taken leave of the truth in trying to sell it to the public. In doing so, it has managed to convince far too many Alaskans that the LNG project is an immediate, legitimate option to a North Slope line to mid-America.
The risk is that Alaskans will tell the producers to take a hike while expecting that the port authority can build its project. Negotiating business deals on bad information is dangerous.
But bad information is what comes out from the port authority, a seven-year-old effort led by the City of Valdez and Fairbanks North Star Borough. Recent port authority ads say its successes include "obtaining congressional approval for $18 billion in federal loan guarantees." That's false. Federal legislation in 2004 gives the port authority -- and any other eligible applicant -- merely the right to apply for federal loan guarantees. There is no guarantee that the port authority would get the guarantee.
Before the U.S. Energy Department could even consider issuing a loan guarantee...
(Excerpt) Read more at adn.com ...
Their timing is perfect, don't ya think?
There is a lot to the story and this is just the good news. I never liked the idea of State involvement at this level. I didn't like it 7 years ago and I like it if anything less now. If the project were good it would be put forth seriously by the industry, that I believe. The question should be whether to build the pipeline over the top or down the Alaska Highway. No one else need apply.
Industry wants it themselves. But they will accept partial state ownership if that is what it takes to get the project approved and moving forward. The current proposals do not require the State to be a 20% owner, but include it as an option.
The question should be whether to build the pipeline over the top or down the Alaska Highway
That question is already decided. My company is one of the ones hired during the evaluation period a few years ago. ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil and BP all support the highway route as the best investment.
LNG will also be coming across from Russia. If the ice cap gets small enough soon it will happen all the quicker. Alaska natural gas will be peripheral to the American market by then. LNG is probably cheaper to build, although it takes more energy to operate than a simple pipeline. LNG will be very big in the world gas market eventually.
Tony won't be doing anything soon. More studies. More environmental concerns. The caribou, the tundra, the terror magnet at Valdez.
Not if built to handle the same volume. The Port Authority is proposing a much smaller LNG facility, 1.2 versus the pipeline 4.5 BCFD.
LNG will also be coming across from Russia
Already here.
Sakhalin Energy has completed the construction of Russia's first LNG loading terminal
Sakhalin Energy has completed the construction of the first LNG loading berth in Russia, as the Company informs.
The berth for the loading of liquefied natural gas (LNG) is one of the integral elements of the LNG production plant that is under construction in the south of Sakhalin.
The berth can receive tankers with tonnage from 18,000 cubic meters to 145,000 cubic meters.
Sakhalin Energy is the operator of the Sakhalin-2 project. Under this project, the Piltun-Actokhskoye and Lunskoye Fields are being developed, their mineable reserves being 17.3 trillion cubic feet of gas and 1 billion barrels of oil.
Good. I am boning up on domestic and commercial gas plumbing so when we gassify the town I can go into the business if I want to. There are a ton of permits to qualify for, worse than welding.
I've heard the opinion of several people in Alaskan Oil Industry. Tony will get a PLA, probably watered down below what unions would want, but he will be able to run on having it. He will support the highway pipeline and tear apart the LNG project against Palin. If she changes to support the highway plan, her switching "sides" will be used against her.
To few people understood the importance of the gas pipeline in this primary election.
The pipeline is the main issue. That's my opinion, but others share it. Alaska's future is not looking so flippin' sweet right now, as Frank might say.
It is and I supported Frank, but he and Jim Clark were their own best enemies
IF the pipeline does not get built, what money will Tony have to squander? Everything from an income tax.
The pipeline has not been built for thirty years. What's a few more decades.
(7) As of July 24, 2004 there were orders for eight-five (85) new LNG Tankers which will be constructed in China (3) France (3), Japan (16), Korea (62) and Spain (1). Eighty-two of the above ships are scheduled for delivered by the year 2007 with three scheduled for delivery in year 2008. (Source: Colton Company)
(8) Referring to Coast Guard Safety Standards Title 46 Part 154.436, the Coast Guard allows the “Design Vapor Pressure of a semi-membrane tank must not exceed 3.55 psig”.
Yep, just one more "fact" in the so-called "All-Alaskan" pipeline. Foreign built ships and pipelines in Canada and Mexico, still they sell it as "All-Alaskan".
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