The Biden administration has granted approval for the Alaska Gasline Development Corp’s (AGDC) project to export liquefied natural gas, according to a document seen by Reuters. The project, valued at $39 billion, is expected to start up by 2030, subject to obtaining the needed permits.
The approval allows exports to countries that do not have a free trade agreement with the US, with destinations including Asian countries. This approval comes as the U.S. looks to compete with Russia for gas exports from the Arctic to Asia. The project involves the construction of a liquefaction facility in Nikiski and an 807-mile-long pipeline for transporting gas from the North Slope.
The Trump administration had first approved exports for the project, which has since faced opposition from environmental groups. The Biden administration conducted an environmental review and concluded that the economic and international energy security benefits outweighed the environmental and imagined climate damage. Notably, the administration also banned the venting of greenhouse gases from the project into the atmosphere, a modification of the Trump approval. But venting gases was not part of the proposal to begin with.
This is the second recent approval of a fossil fuel mega-project by the Biden Administration following ConocoPhillips’ $7 billion Willow oil and gas drilling project, which the administration scaled back dramatically. The approvals of these two projects are bringing harsh criticism from environmental industry voices.
“This is a significant step toward getting more jobs for our families and a boost toward getting the Alaska LNG (AK-LNG) pipeline project built,” said Rick Whitbeck, Alaska State Director of Power The Future. “The approval proves that the Biden Administration finally acknowledges the key role fossil fuels play in our energy future. It’s unfortunate that it took President Biden over two years to realize his ‘America-last’ priorities have killed U.S. jobs, empowered China and led to increased costs for American families. Still, we applaud this action, as AK-LNG is a worthwhile project that deserves to be built.”
If Biden wants it, we don’t want it. His overreach into our state is unconstitutional and he needs to stop.
Biden probably only wants to sell it to China. Remember when Bill Walker (Governor who stole the PFD) was wooing the Chinese on this project? Follow the money, it may help Alaska, but you can bet it will help China and Biden more.
What about our thirst for federal money? Maybe that needs to stop before we expect the United States government to leave us to our own accord
and maybe if the federal government honored the statehood compact, both in letter and in spirit, we would be less dependent on Federal Monies.
That was why we were grated statehood. With 104M acres, selected from the whole state (not the state minus new federal parks, wildernesses, and ancsa/anilca/d2 lands) we had a chance at resource development that would sustain the state.
History matters folks!
So now we assemble a group of old guys with friends in high places, a couple of women for show, and form a board to run this version of the gasline. We pay them all a minimum of $500/K/yr. plus generous allowances and make sure they attend all the fashionable conferences around the World. It would be a shame to actually build a gasline because building it would end the gravy train for all the people getting paid to talk about it. It’s the Alaska way, so don’t be thinking you’re going to be working on building that gasline.
I know just the guy for the board. He’s experienced in natural gas and has very close ties to the White House.
I know that guy! And he is also a crack negotiator.
I lost my job due to Native hire preferences, and I was okay with that. I won’t be okay with that if Alaska law is not followed in regard to this project.
That gasline has been a non starter from the first time the idea was uttered and the $9 million a year they pay to 10 people for the last 10 years to do NOTHING is a sham. The whole idea is NOT economically viable, under any scenario. I think people just can’t do basic math and the bureaucrats that gather in Juneau take advantage of the fact that most people refuse to blow the cash for the flight to holler into the wind.
OTOH, if such a thing is built, it provides an alternative to the Harris – Biden shutdown of oil and natural gas permits in Cook Inlet. Whether it is affordable or not is anyone’s guess. Cheers –
Fat chance this ever comes to fruition! The greenies will pull out all the tricks to stop it. The EPA will slog its progression to the point it’s moving backwards. And the eco-terrorists will attempt to block it at any time or point.
Where is the money coming from? It’s already been proven that it is not financially viable. this is just a ploy to make Biden look good and he knows it won’t be built.
Who’s paying for it? Nobody. Not at the current spot price for LNG?
I am ecstatic that this project is good to go! Environmentalists complaining about this are not true environmentalists imho. They’re ignorant activists.
How is Bill Walker involved within this?
How will he benefit?
But, of coursee. Its just wonderful that OTHER countries can use natural gas just not those icky Americans. They should shiver in the dark… Because CO2 just stays in China where they burn the gas. As long as The BIg Guy gets his cut!!
Bill Walker must feel very left out and lonely. Don’t worry Bill, this proposed gasline has been talked about since 1976. And they’ll be talking about all the way past 2076. It will NEVER get built. I promise.
Once again, the pResident putting the wants of other countries before the needs of the USA.
Here he is, holding the most powerful office on the planet, essentially begging other countries for stuff we did not need until he took office. And, when there are the resources we need, he OK’s shipping them overseas, instead of using them in the US.
Biden’s too busy smoking crack with Hunter. We have a bunch of criminals, druggies, and psychos occupying White House.
An LNG export terminal on the North Slope, with multiple USCG ice breakers (5-ea minimum), makes the most sense and would most likely be more economically viable and sustainable.
Next, we should continue to push for ANWR and a continued westward push for additional lease lands for any-and-all critical resource development throughout the entirety of the North Slope, expedited – guaranteed permitting, with a dramatic reduction of onerous regulations, as well as, “fixed” taxes (State and Federal), with unencumbered access via permanent roads, bridges and shoreline access.
They need that LNG in Fairbanks and especially the villages where fuel oil for heating id $8.30 a gallon!!
Hear! Hear!
But all we’ve heard over the past 50 years is export. That’s where the investors (rich) expect their return (get richer). They don’t care about affordable energy for Alaskans.
try $15.00/gallon in my village…
Russia is a major exporter of natural gas. Russia is also a state sponsor of terror. Russia has made billions of dollars exporting natural gas and LNG.
Alaska has trillions of cubic feet of natural gas. When oil is produced from Prudhoe Bay- the largest oil field in North America- we have to pump natural gas back into the reservoir. That pumping costs money. Alaskans get less for our oil because that cost is deducted. But the industry does a good job stealing from Alaskans by mixing the valuable higher chain alkanes into the oil removed. These include propane, pentane, hexane, etc.
Would the sane players who want a stable supply of LNG prefer to do business with Alaska, over Russia? Or any of the crooked countries who are members of OPEC? Yes.
World LNG prices have risen to as much as 33.00 per MMBTU. Those prices would have been even higher if Europe had a really cold Winter this year. The pipeline can be good for Alaska, especially if Alaskans can get cheap gas from the project. Cheap gas means we can build a manufacturing economy. It also means we can produce electricity more cheaply.
But the best part of this- we can use this project to push the state sponsors of terror in Russia into a weaker economy. When you send missiles into cities killing kids, you deserve nothing but ruin.
The benefit will go solely to China and the left-wing Chinese agents. Don’t expect to see any benefit to Alaska. Biden and the obama promised it to the Chinese.
Rich, the Japanese and S. Koreans are good partners, and are very interested in Alaska gas. We’re relatively close, and we’re not Russia. Last, its not Obama or Biden’s gas to give away. That gas is owned by Alaskans- and various North Slope companies have a lease- hold interest.
But. For the sake of argument, if we sold gas to the Chinese, we’d reduce the $400 billion dollar annual trade deficit we have with China. (I’d personally rather not trade with China- or any nation building nuclear weapons designed to attack… us.
Granted, this is not my area of study but one might wonder, do Biden+kickbacks+China+Walker have any intersections in this story?
Does anyone really think this project will happen? Even with the war in Ukraine gas prices peaked at less than $9 per million btu and have been at the price point that makes any financial sense for 6 months out of the last 174 months, about 3 percent of the time. Shipping directly from the slope makes more financial sense, by a few dollars per mmbtu.
When competing on economic terms as compared to all other global LNG projects, Alaska LNG has consistently come in dead last. LNG competes on a global market.
Back in 1975 when we were in the process of building the Trans Alaska Pipeline to Valdez I asked an Engineer who represented the Pipeline Consortium why the Pipe Pad was 80′ in Width. It seemed rather excessive given that the pipe line was only 48″ wide and the VSM’s were about 10′ apart. His answer was that it was for the addition of a Gas Line.
When one considers that construction of that pad consisted of two layers of Extruded Polystyrene , hand laid over Tundra prior to the application of the gravel pad or road bed for some 400 miles plus… millions of board feet of foam trucked from DuPont’s factory somewhere. I recall flying over the site and watching crews of perhaps 20 Laborers laying foam ahead of the gravel filling operation. One crew was tasked merely with retrieving broken foam chunks that were carried far afield in the wind. Lots and Lots of Labor!
I was a kid back then, I’m considered by some to be an Old Man now, and yet like the Knik Arm Bridge the Gas Line is nowhere to be seen.
Thanks for that comment, Robert!
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I’ve walked the pipeline corridor for many miles, and I always wondered why the existing pipeline is not in the center of the cleared corridor. Now it makes sense.
We should have also sought approval for the state missile launch site at Kodiak to build and launch the first transgender flight to Mars, the first AMHS autonomous sailing to China and Japan, a rail link to who knows where, etc. A present value amount of about $10 billion in state general funds has been spent on a North Slope gas line so far, and we still pay people high six figure amounts to meet, take minutes, travel to conferences, etc. TransCanada people retired with 8 figure bonuses from the $200 million the Walker administration paid them. We are fools, and will be until the money has gone.
What’s this, the 30 pieces of silver story, twenty-first century version?
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If not, what guarantee do Americans have that “…exports to countries that do not have a free trade agreement with the US, with destinations including Asian countries” means -none- of Alaska’s natural gas is going directly or indirectly, to Communist China or to its allies?
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If not, what guarantee do Americans have that “…exports to countries that do not have a free trade agreement with the US, with destinations including Asian countries” means -none- of Alaska’s natural gas goes directly or indirectly, to Communist China in lieu of payments from countries mired in Chinese debt-trap loan agreements?
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Wonder what happens to Alaska and the Permanent Fund if Biden’s sanctions cause the dollar to lose reserve-currency status before the project is completed, and Communist China, through a proxy such as Black Rock, is the only investor willing and able to bail out the project.
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Undoubtedly, the Alaska State Director of Power The Future has answers, no?
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