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TransCanada gets final permits for Coastal GasLink pipeline to Kitimat,  CBC.ca.  The 650-kilometre pipeline would link natural gas fields in northeastern …


“If I had just known….”

by

Dave Harbour

Sometimes I look back and think, “If I had just known my dear friend or family member was going to die last week, I’d have spent more time with him/her and….   If…. If….”   In my more rational moments, I recall that while I cannot change the past — and should not let the past dominate my thinking — I can work harder to perfect each future moment and decision.

During its nearly decade long quest to secure Alaskan Arctic project permits, shell was continually abused by the federal government, various Alaska nonprofit organizations, local governments and a union boss.

Thankfully, many Alaskans appeared at public hearings supporting Shell while there was still a chance its patience, deep pockets and Arctic technical expertise would reward shareholders for their investment and would assist Alaska in enhancing throughput of the state’s economic umbilical cord, the Trans Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS).

Sadly, all of the positive, expensive, responsible and longsuffering efforts by the international investor and supportive Alaskan citizens were not enough.  Shell and her people will be missed in many, critical ways.

ConocoPhillips (i.e. see story below), BP, ExxonMobil and a number of other energy companies are valiantly attempting to maintain Alaskan investments when low oil prices and chaos in Juneau hardly provide incentives for future investment.

Perhaps this reminder of oil industry contributions to Alaska will help us all remember to thank the pioneers and veterans of Alaska’s energy industry. After all, our constitution rests on the principle that the state will survive on natural resource development…and, the oil industry depends on available and RELIABLE future supplies.

Appreciating Alaskans’ symbiotic relationship with all of the natural resource industries is critical to the proper and welcoming treatment of natural resource investors.

No, we cannot change the policies previous generations of citizens and elected officials put into place.  But we can learn from our earlier decisions.  We can strive to perfect our decision making based on what we have learned — if we commit ourselves to learning.

Better to wake up and learn to fly right today, than look back a year from now regretting the departure of other responsible and admirable industry employees and companies…and investments.

Doesn’t that make good sense?

–dh

(Our comment is largely taken from FB post complimenting UNITED WAY for its Shell posting today: https://www.facebook.com/dave.harbour.7/posts/10208235956649939?notif_t=like&notif_id=1462543852425799)


United Way of Anchorage's photo.
United Way of Anchorage's photo.

United Way of Anchorage added 2 new photos.

Even though Shell Oil Company Anchorage employees received the unfortunate news last fall that their company was pulling out of the state, they raised over $50,000 during Campaign. We are very thankful for the continued support of these generous donors!

(FB Link: https://www.facebook.com/dave.harbour.7/posts/10208235956649939?notif_t=like&notif_id=1462543852425799)


With Shell gone from the Arctic, US official fears fading attention to the region


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Price crash halves ASRC’s 7(i) sharing with regional corps  Alaska Native corporations will bear some of the same revenue losses the state endures as a result of dwindling oil production and prices. The State of Alaska is running a $4.1 billion budget deficit… Read more


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 In a first, no bids offered at Cook Inlet lease sale   –    No bidders showed up for a Cook Inlet oil and gas lease sale planned for May 5, and a top industry official blames a toxic political environment that has developed in Juneau over oil and gas tax… Read more 


Exxon’s 1Q profit plunges 63 percent on lower oil prices


 

“What should Alaska do now that Shell is gone?”

We can only hope that Alaskan citizens and elected officials can better appreciate natural resource investments in wake of Shell’s departure.

One way to become a more welcoming investment climate is to not over tax investors after the investments have been made.  Another way to be a welcoming place is to not demonize and continually criticize investors.  Another way is for individual citizens and government officials and nonprofit corporations to make greater efforts to testify in support of natural resource projects when state and federal regulators hold permit application hearings.

If citizens and public officials do not learn any lessons from the economic vacuum they will encounter with Shell’s absence, will they not be more clearly signalling to the world that Alaska is a terrible place to invest?

Surely, no Alaska citizen or elected official would be naive enough to think that Shell’s departure, the Federal role in closing down Alaska and Alaska’s own political chaos will go unnoticed by the nation’s credit rating agencies, right?

-dh


 

S&P finds Alaska with ‘unique exposure’ to oil prices  Standard and Poor’s Rating Services took a look at what makes some oil states’ futures look bleaker…



ConocoPhillps loses $1.47B in 1Q, pays 96.4% effective tax rate in Alaska

By:

Andrew Jensen

Alaska Journal of Commerce

Posted:

Thu, 04/28/2016 – 10:52am

ConocoPhillips posted a loss of $1.47 billion in the first quarter of 2016, including a $2 million net loss from its Alaska operations.

The state’s largest oil producer increased its output year-over-year by 4.3 percent, from 163,000 barrels per day in the first quarter of 2015 compared to 170,000 in 2016.

It also spent $320 million in capital expenditures in Alaska, down from the $402 million spent in the same period of 2015, which reflects the work done throughout last year to bring the CD-5 site into production last October.

Although ConocoPhillips said Thursday that it is lowering its full-year capital expenditures outlook to $5.7 billion from $6.4 billion, the company announced last week it will spend $190 million to fully drill out CD-5 this year and next, and reach its production target of 16,000 barrels per day this year.

Last fall, ConocoPhillips announced it has sanctioned development of the adjoining Greater Mooses Tooth-1project that has potential to produce 30,000 barrels per day.    More Here….