Nellie Cournoyea Says Move Mackenzie Pipe Ahead, With or Without Settled Claims – NEB To Decide By September – Senator Mark Begich Pushes OCS Revenue Sharing

Weigh In On OCS Today! World News.  If approved, the 1,200-kilometre pipeline would run from the Beaufort Sea and through the N.W.T.'s Mackenzie Valley to northern Alberta, where it would connect with existing gas networks. (CBC) The Mackenzie Valley natural gas pipeline should go ahead, whether the last holdout First Nation has a settled land claim or not, says Inuvialuit leader and former N.W.T. premier Nellie Cournoyea (NGP Photo)....  (Comment:  For the sake of the people of the Territories, the health of oil sands production, the throughput of the TransCanada system, the sustainability of Northern cultures and [...]

By |2016-03-13T04:05:06-09:00April 23rd, 2010|Commentary, NEB|0 Comments
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See Our Monday Washington Times Op-Ed

  National Energy Policy Commentary.  See the full, correct copy below, of today's Barack Obama - Ken Salazar Op-Ed we provided the Washington Times late last week.  Or, see the edited, online Washington Times version.  (Other reactions: 1)   State Policy Commentary.  (Note: As we discuss sensitive state policy issues, we do not challenge that state officials are pledged to act with the best of intent, in the public interest.  In these notes, we do our best, however, to follow strings of logic based on history and verifiable facts.  At the end of the process, we hope [...]

By |2016-03-13T04:07:16-09:00April 5th, 2010|Commentary, Federal Obstruction|0 Comments
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3-18-2010 TODAY IS AN IMPORTANT ANNIVERSARY: 29 YEARS AGO TODAY, ALASKA’S LEADERS DEFINED FAIR SHARE OF OIL AND GAS REVENUES!

(Note: ADN's Richard Mauer reviews current oil/gas tax complexity while ADN's Rindi White reveals crippling tourism tax details and Alaska Dispatch's Rena Delbridge reports on tough going for tax policy.)  On This Day in 1981 Alaska Defined 'Fair Share' Commentary by Dave Harbour On March 18, 1981 the most unique gathering in Alaska's political history may have occurred when Republican Governor  Jay Hammond (NGP Photo with author, 6-2001) met with Senate President Jay Kerttula and House Speaker Jim Duncan (both democrats) along with a large array of other Republican and Democrat leaders, in [...]

By |2018-03-18T06:24:46-09:00March 18th, 2010|Alaska Taxes, Commentary|0 Comments
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03-08-2010 Energy Council Hears Moratoria Study Report

See Our Original Moratoria Story With Many National Media Links Here is audio of the Alaska Legislators' report on the Energy Council Meeting Washington, D.C., by NGP Staff.  On Saturday, March 6, public officials from throughout the U.S. heard a report from the NARUC-administered Study Group on findings of its almost 2-year-long, $300 thousand study to determine the social, economic and environmental costs of continuing a national policy that restricts access to energy resources on Federal lands. The Energy Council was convened at its 2010 Federal Energy & Environmental Matters Conference [...]

By |2016-09-23T17:32:49-09:00March 8th, 2010|Commentary, Federal Obstruction, Federal Progress|0 Comments
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2-18-10 After the ‘Moratoria Report’

"After the Oil and Gas Moratoria Report...." Notes From: Dave Harbour, NARUC commissioner Emeritus, reporting from Washington D.C.  (See Related Stories Over the Next Week, latest) Monday, a Study Group composed of regulatory commissioners, consultants, government and university economists and non-profit association sponsors met to deliver their energy research report, responding to a National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) resolution issued in July 2007 (our earlier story), entitled, "Developing Reliable Research Regarding the Social, Economic and Environmental Effects of Maintaining Domestic Energy Exploration and Production Moratoria On and Beneath Federal Lands."  The forum [...]

By |2016-11-02T22:27:26-09:00February 18th, 2010|Commentary, Federal Obstruction|0 Comments
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National Study Reveals Consequences of Restrictions on Domestic Energy Exploration

 NARUC Gas Committee Receives Final Report Detailing Oil/Gas Moratoria Impacts   WASHINGTON— A public/private Study Group today reported to the nation’s State utility regulators in Washington that its By Daniel Whitten Feb. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Restrictions on oil and gas drilling will cost the U.S. economy $2.36 trillion through 2029.... Dave Harbour, a retired commissioner of the Regulatory Commission of Alaska, who helped oversee the study, said the calculation of lost GDP was based on the contribution the untapped oil and gas revenues would make .... research has identified trillions [...]

By |2016-03-13T02:46:40-09:00February 15th, 2010|Commentary|0 Comments
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2-5-10 Thursday in Anchorage was another big day for discussion of taxes and economics 101. Steve Hites and the investment-repelling cruise ship tax for breakfast. Dan Fagan and a blue ribbon panel debate petroleum tax policy over lunch.

  First, See Our Alaska Petroleum Tax Commentary From Yesterday Opinion: Two Tax Events Today Underscore Need for Legislative Action THIS YEAR! By Dave Harbour Yesterday's tax discussions kicked off with a 7:30 a.m. presentation at the Resource Development Council for Alaska (RDC) meeting by Steve Hites (NGP Photo), owner of the Skagway Streetcar Company.  Hites could easily qualify for the national speakers' circuit with his humorous and sardonic touches on history, current events and public policy.  (See speech text and video here.)   Hites recited the history of the Alaska [...]

By |2017-02-26T02:35:58-09:00February 5th, 2010|ACES, Alaska Taxes, Alaska's Fiscal Crisis, Alaskanomics, Commentary, Uncategorized|0 Comments
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2-4-2010 “I don’t do vision statements very well.” (Gas Pipeline Federal Coordinator) – We Comment on Legislators’ Criticism of Alliance Effort to Save Alaska

1.  ADN.  On Tuesday, Sen. Lisa Murkowski asked Larry Persily (NGP Photo), the president's nominee to be federal coordinator of the Alaska gas line project, how he would apply his knowledge of oil and gas through a "federal lens." "I just deal in reality," Persily said. "I don't do vision statements very well."  (Commentary:  Good answer, Larry.  Too many are speculating; too few are speaking with restraint based on facts. - dh) Representative Les Gara, Anchorage, Alaska. Northern Gas Pipelines File Photo by Dave Harbour (Added post-publication of story) [...]

By |2017-02-26T02:29:12-09:00February 4th, 2010|ACES, Alaska's Fiscal Crisis, Alaskanomics, Commentary|0 Comments
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12-28-09 All I Wanted For Christmas…. All I Want For This New Year….

On December 24, 2001 we wrote an editorial satirizing the human greed and mismanagement that was interfering with gas pipeline project advancement. In those days, Alaskan leaders and their supporters were engaged in the beginning of a decade-long fest of spending gluttony and tax increases to support self gratification of one generation at the expense of those to follow.     Leaders professed that because of the natural resource blessings graced on the state, those resources had almost mystical value on the world market, unaffected by a growing burden of [...]

By |2016-03-13T03:48:14-09:00December 28th, 2009|Alaska Taxes, Commentary, Interstate Gas|0 Comments
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American/Alaskan Economy and Citizens Are Endangered Species!

Comment.  Yesterday, the world heard that the U.S. Minerals Management Service (MMS) had conditionally approved Shell Oil Company's 2010 Chukchi Sea Plan of Exploration.  Amid the celebrating, however, one notes that the Federal Administration strategy to invoke death by a thousand cuts is alive and well.  For example, while MMS conditionally approves, the Environmental Protection Agency still dallies and evades a timely granting of an air quality permit--which can still stop Shell's multi-billion dollar investment in Alaska's OCS.  (To her credit, Senator Lisa Murkowski (NGP Photo) responded that, "Shell Oil is in [...]

By |2016-03-13T03:57:26-09:00December 8th, 2009|Arctic Policy, Commentary, Federal Obstruction, OCS|0 Comments
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Are Alaskans “Citizens” or “Sovereigns”?

                                    Bill Walker is the sort of man I would like to have as a next door neighbor: kindly, thoughtful, a good listener, slow to anger, and, he loves Alaska.  Just because a person has attractive personal qualities, does not qualify him to dictate Alaska state policies.  If Bill were elected, be sure that he would do all within Alaska's "sovereign" power to dictate gas pipeline policy to the free market.  And, if [...]

By |2016-03-13T03:57:26-09:00October 26th, 2009|Alaska Taxes, Commentary, Interstate Gas, Intrastate Gas, LNG|0 Comments
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Big Chance To Weigh In On Future Of Alaska’s Economy and Lifestyle! In Canada, Government Delay is Also Part of the Problem

  Regulatory Delay And The One Project-One Assessment Proposal By Marie H. Buchinski, Kelsey J. Drozdowski, and Celeste M. Hutchinson In Canada, the federal, provincial and territorial governments have assumed a role in the development and operation of various energy projects, particularly those that have the potential to impact the environment. This separation of jurisdiction between the levels of government, arising in part from the division of powers under the Constitution Act, 1867, has demonstrably contributed to regulatory delays regarding project approvals because of the sometimes difficult task of coordinating the [...]

By |2016-03-13T03:58:37-09:00October 14th, 2009|Commentary, Federal Obstruction|0 Comments
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10-12-2009. Beware Beelzebub’s Enticements! With Sen. Lindsey Graham Caving In and NOAA Weighing In, the Cumulative Attack On Alaska-US OCS Domestic Energy Gains Momentum!

Two Federal agency threats to our way of life require our letters TODAY.  Please write, and send us a copy here. LA Times, by Jim Tankersley and Josh Meyer. The federal government's top ocean scientists are urging the Interior Department to drastically reduce plans to open the coast to offshore oil and gas drilling, citing threats to marine life and potentially devastating effects of oil spills in Arctic waters. The recommendations by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are informal and not binding. But if adopted, they would restrict development in some [...]

By |2016-03-13T03:43:42-09:00October 12th, 2009|Commentary, Enviro-Industrial-Governmental Cabal, Federal Obstruction|0 Comments
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Cumulative Federal Actions Threaten Alaska and the Nation!

Updates to "cumulative effects": 03-15-10.  Governor Sean Parnell's (NGP Photo) Battles with the Federal Government 12-23-09.  Sullivan and Young Fight Beluga Designation 12-08-09.  Alaskan and American Consumers are Endangered Species 12-16-09.  Council on Environmental Quality Interim Framework for Marine Spatial Planning (Ocean Policy). EDITORIAL AND CALL TO ACTION: DEATH BY A THOUSAND CUTS Dateline, Biloxi, by Dave Harbour.   Last week I editorialized about how current  Washington attacks on domestic energy are cumulative, and threaten the economies of Alaska and the country.  This week, I appeared before the IOGCC (Scroll down to see [...]

By |2016-03-13T04:00:26-09:00October 8th, 2009|Commentary, Federal Obstruction|0 Comments
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Alaska North Slope Propane Project: Energy Lifesaver for Rural and Urban Alaska?

Commentary and News: ANS Propane Could Be the Biggest Story of 2009! by Dave Harbour, NGP Publisher If there is an opportunity, I will invest some of my retirement savings on a state agency's impressive orchestration of a solid, public-private partnership designed to make North Slope Liquid Propane Gas Available to Alaska consumers at reasonable but not subsidized prices.   Mary Ann Pease, (NGP Photo), an Alaska Natural Gas Development Authority (ANGDA) consultant, said yesterday that a large, two-day business meeting in the ANGDA offices last Thursday and Friday resulted in her [...]

By |2016-03-13T03:57:24-09:00September 29th, 2009|Commentary, You Read It Here First|0 Comments
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