Alaska senators propose 'bullet' gas pipeline through Denali National Park

Washington (Platts)--9Feb2011/641 pm EST/2341 GMT

Alaska's US senators have introduced legislation to allow construction of a natural gas pipeline through the Denali National Park, a contingency state leaders want in the event a larger North Slope pipeline project fails or faces severe delays.

Senators Lisa Murkowski, a Republican, and Mark Begich, a Democrat, filed the Denali National Park and Preserve Natural Gas Pipeline Act late Tuesday. It would authorize a right-of-way along the park highway, allowing a pipeline to run from gas fields in the North Slope to south-central Alaska.

"Southcentral needs natural gas and an in-state line provides an alternative solution to their future needs," Murkowski said in a statement. "By eliminating the uncertainty of permitting and regulatory delays, the parks highway route will be able to compete on a level playing field with other proposed routes."

The state is looking to a so-called "bullet" gas pipeline to meet a gas shortage predicted to start in 2012 or 2013. The 24-inch-diameter line would run about 750 miles from Prudhoe Bay to the Cook Inlet.

Gas fields in southern Alaska are becoming depleted, and the mammoth 48-inch-diameter pipeline proposed to run from the North Slope to the Lower-48 states has hit major obstacles.

Murkowski and Begich called the park route the "shortest and most logical" option for a bullet line through or around a 10-mile bottleneck created by the Nenana River Canyon and Denali. They said it would also allow the park to install electricity generation and a compressed natural gas system to fuel park vehicles.

The same language was included in a 2009 bill that passed the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee but did not make it to the Senate floor.

--Meghan Gordon, meghan_gordon@platts.com

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