“ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - Alaska’s three largest North Slope oil producers are proposing to build a pipeline to bring North America’s largest natural gas reserves to the lower 48 states. ExxonMobil Corp., ConocoPhillips and BP own Alaska’s natural gas.”
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“The pipeline would extend from the North Slope to Fairbanks, and southeast to Alberta, Canada. From there, it would go to the Chicago area.”
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" The North Slope producers’ proposal contains a provision sought by the state - ownership in the pipeline.
BP, ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil spent $125 million on a joint feasibility study in 2001-2002. It concluded that the economic risks were too great to the companies.
The project, however, gained fresh momentum when Congress promised loan guarantees for 80 percent of the pipeline’s cost, and gave developers other tax breaks as well as promises of less burdensome permitting requirements. "
(Sigh!) Why can’t we do the same for the nation’s rail transportation needs?
It is not economical to move natural gas in thes kinds of quantitiies by rail unless you like to see natural gas costs nearly double. It is probably logitically impossible to move that qauntity by rail. Moving these kinds of quantities by rail is almost like shipping autos from Detroit piece by piece in boxes by Fed Ex.
Gasoline also ships by pipeline, just too much quantity to move economically and effectively by rail.
A pipeline is the most effective way to move enormous quantities of liquids around. There are very little ways things can go wrong, there’s very little downtime, and it can operate continuously every single second of the year.
Great idea, It just needs some good politics and a lot of money behind it. Open up Alaska and the Canadian Northwest to economic development on a real industrialization program with developed industries, real infastructure, large cities where there was just wilderness, schools, universities, and commerce. This would bring out the blessings of free enterprise to the North. Their economies have long laged behind the lower 48 and the Southern Provences of Canada and have been treated either as colonies for exploitation from the Eastern interests, stepchildren to their respective nations or as a tree hugger paradise for those wishing to create heaven on earth. A railroad is a good first start. I just hope that it has a chance to happen
If the economics were close rail vs. pipeline you have a problem with the oil people not wanting to risk doing something new. The are use to moving product by water and pipeline not by rail. When we worked with Shell on the first CA TankTrain from Saco to Wilmington, CA this was the big stumbling block that was going to sink the project until the finance guys in London and the Hauge knocked some heads together.
The Alaska Railroad ships thousands of tank car loads of aviation fuel to the Anchorage regional airport every year. I know this because I was there in September of 2003. I wi***o quote slotracer, “Gasoline also ships by pipeline, just too much quantity to move economically and effectively by rail.” Well, Slotracer doesn’t know what he is talking about!
My experience tells me he does know what he is talking about. The move into the airbase is a fairly small move. Pipeline quanities are in the millions of car load equivilants not a thousand or so. Also, this project is talking about natural gas which is currently embargoed from the railroads due to the hazourd.
The History Channel recently had a show about oil. When the pipeline from Texas to the Midwest and Northeast was built during WWII, they tried shipping by rail during constructionn, but solid tank trains couln’t come close to what a pipline can carry. Shared access was/is common. Although it takes 10-12 days, when a Shell refinery in Texas puts 10000 gallons of 97 octane unleaded in, they can take 10000 gallons out of the other end the very next day. What they take out may have been put in by a BP refinery. The additive package is added to the generic product at the tank farm to delievery truck terminals.
M’mm lets check with the NY Times or the Washington Post & see if the guys in the RR ivory towers have subscriptions to those publications. Maybe we should conduct a poll as they leave the office to see if they know even how to access those web sites. [:o)][:I]
UP829 and others hit the nail on the head about petroleum transportation. Pipeline by far is the best means for moving large quantities of both liquid and gaseous products. If we tried to move all of the crude oil in this country by rail you would need a dedicated double track line between the field and the refinery. $$$ Remember that the oil (and gas) fields are spread out over wide areas and rail lines to all of them would be cost prohibitive. More $$$ To haul natural gas by rail you would either need to have high pressure vessels (oxygen bottles) which would be very costly. The other alternative is liquification of natural gas. Much more $$$$ Turning the gas into a liquid gives a huge volume advantage-600 standard cubic feet of natural gas equals one cubic foot of liquified natural gas. The boogie man is that this is done at approximately 260ºF below zero. This takes a large and expensive cryogenic plant then the tank cars must be a large thermos bottle. I think they will cost a little more than a conventional tank car. This is done today in ships that transport natural gas from the middle east to Europe, Japan, or the good old USA. Upon arrival the gas must be regassified to enter the domestic market. More $$$. A rule of thumb is that you need atleast 3 trillion cubic feet of available gas to justify a liquified natural gas setup. And thisa is considering putting it in a ship which has refigeration to keep the gas in the liquid state. How will you do this on the rail? All of the liqified natural gas receiving terminals in the US are removed from major metropolitan areas. With rail lines going through metro areas I can just hear the Washington DC city council screaming about this. A tank car of propane or hydrocloric acid is nothing compared to the LNG tank car blowing up. You might ask: Why worry about the temperature rising? Just keep the cork in the bottle and it will stay as a liquid. The second boogie man comes to town. As the temperature rises to 117ºF below zero you reach the crit
Good luck on a pipeline that passes through Canada (if it’s allowed) we are having problems here with domestic pipelines now on crossing lands on Native reserves, and the government is increasing ancient land grants to thousands of square miles to be under control of reserve leaders and Dept. of Indian Affairs. I guess Canada should be building a pipeline across the U.S. to Mexico, see how far this scheme would get ! !
Also try building a railway across 1800 miles of muskeg, not an easy task, I watched whole sections of railway track used as pilings in muskeg disappear along with a couple of bulldozers, this would be an interesting project indeed.
As a matter of practicallity, it is akin to open access. The project promoters have agreed to give access to the smaller players in the area. Any small producer who comes into existence in the future will be allowed access to the pipeline to ship their portion.
As a rule, most pipelines in the U.S. will allow smaller producers to use their pipelines, and indeed most pipeline companies today are divested of the ownership of natural gas, oil, or gasoline. Pipeline companies in effect are nothing but infrastructure providers, and are very successful doing so.
One of the most prosperous companies in the U.S. today is Kinder-Morgan, a pipeline company, whose president Richard Kinder would be my choice to lead a rail infrastructure company.