Fairbanks News Miner/AP. Federal regulators have stopped the review process for an Alaska gas pipeline until TransCanada Corp. decides whether the pipeline will carry gas across Canada to Lower 48 markets or it will pursue a liquefied natural gas option.
Calgary Herald by Kelly Cryderman. Even if oil and gas markets jump upwards this year, Finance Minister Doug Horner said the province must still grapple with the predicament of how to cash in on higher world oil prices for Alberta’s bargain-basement bitumen. One day after projecting a daunting deficit as high as $3 billion this year, Horner said the price differential Alberta producers receive for their oil is not going to shrink as fast as commodity markets could rise in the coming months.
Alaska Dispatch by Craig Medred. U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar (NGP Photo) shocked even Shell itself by announcing the company could proceed with preliminary drilling of a single well in the empty sea 61 miles from this village. Salazar did impose limits. The company must stop drilling nearly a mile short of any expected pools of oil and gas. Still, the conditional approval will allow Shell to finally get to work after six years of waiting. At Shell's headquarters in Anchorage, the mood was optimistic. [...]
ADN, by Lisa Demer. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (NGP Photo), R-Alaska, on Monday wrapped up an "energy tour" of Alaska with Democratic colleague Ron Wyden (NGP Photo) of Oregon that included a renewable energy fair, a geothermal plant at Chena Hot Springs, and an offshore oil platform in Cook Inlet. ... "You're looking at the chairman of the energy committee here. And we're not sure if I'm looking at him or he's looking at me." Depending on how the November elections go, either she or Wyden is poised to become chair [...]
Kenai Peninsula Clarion. 2. What role should the Legislature play in ensuring the future energy security of Alaska? Joe Arness: Clearly, some portion of our current income stream should be dedicated to energy security. That would include both renewable and non-renewable sources. Simply giving lip service to such planning will leave us wanting as time goes by...there needs to be a funded, thoughtful program whose purpose is to review and encourage alternatives. Cathy Giessel: Rising energy costs affect businesses and citizens. The Legislature must act to facilitate an in-state natural gas [...]
Vote 'No' on 2! ADN Op-Ed by Governor Frank Murkowski (NGP Photo). The Coastal Zone Planning Initiative that will appear on the Aug. 28 primary ballot as Measure 2 is very different from the bill that passed the House 40-0 in the 2011 session of the Legislature. As proof -- only 7 out of 60 Alaska Legislators supported Proposition 2 when it was proposed as legislation in the 2012 session of the Legislature. Remember: • There had been debate on coastal zone for two years, so Legislators were fully aware [...]
As we noted yesterday ("Shameful Management...."), the Financial Post report below represents a sharp contrast between comptently managed Canadian natural resource policy and incompetently managed U.S. natural resource policy. Scroll down for additional evidence from Chairman Doc Hastings (NGP Photo) that the American Executive Branch is ill-prepared and/or ill-disposed to serve. -dh Financial Post. Stephen Harper is on his annual visit to the North this week, quoting Robert Service and boosting the region’s vast resource potential. “The North” holds a particular place in the Canadian psyche, somewhat similar to that of [...]
Publisher's Note: Yesterday we commented (here) on Ballot Measure 2. Several readers responded to our commentary here. But we think today's ADN Op-ed by Consumer Energy Alliance - Alaska President Steve Pratt (NGP Photo) sums it up very well, below. -dh Ballot Measure 2, establishing an Alaska coastal zone management program, is bad for Alaska energy consumers. Energy costs in Alaska are high. In Southcentral, "cheap" natural gas has run its course. Fairbanks is suffering with very high fuel oil costs. Rural Alaska energy costs are even higher. A [...]
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, (NGP Photo), yesterday introduced bipartisan legislation to expand American offshore energy production with a revised five-year leasing plan and provide revenue sharing to all participating coastal states. The Offshore Petroleum Expansion Now Act of 2012 – OPEN Act – is co-sponsored by Sens. Jim Webb, Mark Warner; Mary Landrieu; John Hoeven; Jim Inhofe, R-Okla Fairbanks News Miner by Matt Buxton. House Speaker Mike Chenault is expected to focus on the state’s energy woes and discuss the direction of the House Majority’s efforts after his favored measure, House Bill 9, [...]
Brad Keithley (NGP Photo) Commentary. The Alaska "House Special Committee on Fiscal Policy " (this week) released a new website focused on "Understanding Alaska's Budget." The website may explain much more than the authors intend about how Alaska has worked itself into its coming fiscal crisis -- and why recent legislatures have made the problem worse. The press release announcing the website provides the first clue. The release quotes the Chair of the House Special Committee as follows: “We’re in the cat-bird seat, financially, now, but with throughput this week under 400,000 barrels, and with a volatile oil price, [...]
Alaska Journal of Commerce by Tim Bradner (NGP Photo). With its Arctic drill fleet now assembled in Dutch Harbor, Shell is waiting on unpredictable Mother Nature. Summer ice conditions along the northern Alaska coast are the worst in a 10-year period, Shell spokesman Curtis Smith (NGP Photo-R) said July 9. The heavy ice has caused target dates for the company’s first drilling at two exploration prospects in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas to be pushed into the first week of August, Smith said. “This is the heaviest ice coverage we [...]
Chairman Doc Hastings (NGP Photo) invites Interior Department officials to the 'hot seat'. House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (WA-04) on Friday, July 13 sent a letter to Department of the Interior Secretary Ken Salazar regarding the Committee’s request for transcribed interviews with five Department officials who were personally involved in developing the May 2010 Interior Department report that falsely stated independent engineers had peer reviewed and supported a drilling moratorium. In this follow-up letter, Chairman Hastings states that he intends to invite the five Department officials, and possibly [...]
