"It is going to take a big turnaround in the market, no doubt about it," Larry Persily, federal coordinator of Alaska Natural Gas Transportation Projects, said at the event in Washington, D.C.
TransCanada and ExxonMobil have been working with state and federal officials on plans to build a $40 billion, 48-inch-diameter pipeline from the North Slope to the Canadian border, where Canadian pipelines would carry gas to the Lower-48.
However, shale gas development has dampened U.S. demand for the gas, and North Slope producers BP, ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil met with Alaska Governor Sean Parnell before the conference to discuss alternatives to the project, including a pipeline to a new liquefied natural gas (LNG) export project.
After the meeting, BP CEO Bob Dudley and ConocoPhillips CEO Jim Mulva said the LNG project seemed to be a better way to get the gas to market, casting growing doubts on the viability of the pipeline.
Persily acknowledged that the pipeline's future hinges on the producers. "It is going to take concurrence of the three producers. They are the ones that control the vast majority of the leased acreage, the production coming out of there. They are the ones that are going to have to sign 20-year firm shipping commitments on the pipeline worth more than $100 billion."
Persily said he thought the project had a 50-50 chance of being constructed by 2020. "I haven't given up on the project. ... What it would take is the companies believing the market is there at a sufficient price."
He also noted that there are key benefits to building the pipeline instead of the LNG project. The Alaska Natural Gas Pipeline Act provides federal loan guarantees for the pipeline, and $21 billion worth of guarantees are currently authorized, he said. The law also allows for accelerated depreciation for the pipeline and an enhanced oil recovery investment tax credit for the gas treatment plant, which together are worth more than $1 billion in tax savings, he added.
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