Interviewed yesterday on Canada's show, CTV NewsQuestion Period, Canadian Environment Minister, Jim Prentice predicted that a natural gas pipeline from Canada's McKenzie River valley an the Arctic regions may begin as soon as the end of 2009:Environment Minister Jim Prentice says he is "optimistic" that work on the controversial Mackenzie Gas Project, which proposes building a pipeline to deliver northern natural gas to Canadian and U.S. markets, will begin soon after numerous delays for environmental and community assessments.
The project was first proposed in 2001 by a consortium of oil producers that includes Imperial Oil, ExxonMobil Corp., Shell Canada and ConocoPhillips.
The 1,220-kilometre pipeline would ship natural gas through the Mackenzie Valley in the Northwest Territories from northern offshore gas fields, but the project has been bogged down by community and environmental consultations.
Prentice went on to say that Alaska's pipeline project into Canada will have to wait until the producer consortium's project is done, if not longer:
He also indicated that a much talked-about Alaska pipeline is much further behind, with environmental, regulatory and other consultations yet to be done.
That's the pipeline Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin likes to tell people she is responsible for already having begun.
1 comment:
There are no surprises for me in the Canadian Minister of Environment's statements. What he is saying is what Transcanada has been saying all along, and is consistent with the progression of NG transport projects currently described on the Transcanada web site. Currently Transcanada has over 5000 miles of significant NG pipeline projects in their queue, including the Alaska NG line.
Obama may be able to change the progression of projects through diplomacy and supportive economic measures.
The history of the MacKenzie Valley Pipeline extends back to the early 1970s, to the Inuit Tapirisat movement, and to the early Alaskan Arctic Gas initiative for an NG pipeline from Prudhoe eastward.
I do not know if Palin's statements have been consistent about all this. I doubt it, and trust your eye on this matter, Phillip. AGIA and Transcanada were not solely accomplished by Palin, and for her to say so is inaccurate. I will say that the integrity and competence of Tom Irwin and Marty Rutherford is a very different subject from the credibility and competence of Palin, and I hope those issues are kept separate. For example, if a progressive Democrat were to win the governorship, I would hope that both AGIA and Transcanada would continue, so long as milestones were met.
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