By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, July 9 -- Alaska has formed a public-private partnership to build an intrastate gas pipeline to serve south-central and interior Alaska.
The system would begin service in 2013 with a capacity of 460 MMcfd of gas—about twice current demand. The supply would mainly come from undiscovered supplies in Cook Inlet, interior basins along the pipeline, and the North Slope foothills, officials said.
Construction would start at Cook Inlet and progress north along the Richardson Highway for about 400 miles, reaching Fairbanks and interior Alaska by 2013.
If sufficient supplies fail to materialize from the Cook Inlet and Copper River basins and exploration along the pipeline, a second phase would involve a leg to bring gas from the North Slope foothills.
If the second phase were not needed, the line could be connected to the pipeline planned to move North Slope gas to Canada and the Lower 48, officials said, when it is completed in 2018-20.
Forming the partnership were the Alaska Natural Gas Development Authority, Enstar Natural Gas Co., and the state, said Gov. Sarah Palin. She said specifics would be worked out this fall in time to be added to appropriations legislation in January 2009. Construction would start in 2011.
