A Citizen’s Guide

Many lawmakers have questioned why the proposed gas contract does not specifically prohibit the major producers—ExxonMobil, BP and ConocoPhillips—from pushing an “over the top” pipeline project.

Exxon has long favored a route across the top of Alaska to hook into a pipe being planned for Canada. State law prohibits such a project, but state law can be changed.

Jim Clark, Gov. Frank Murkowski’s chief of staff, said the description of the project in the contract specifies that the pipeline be built along the Alaska Highway. Read the rest of this entry »

The Murkowski administration is expected to release a handful of amendments to the Stranded Gas Development Act on Wednesday. The governor has said the amendments are needed to make legal some of the provisions in the proposed contract with the state’s three major oil companies currently being considered by the Legislature.

John Manly, spokesman for Gov. Frank Murkowski, was unsure how many amendments will be released tomorrow. But he said he expects them to come in the form of four or five bills.

No word yet on how many state laws besides the stranded gas act will need to be amended. Read the rest of this entry »

Gov. Frank Murkowski filed the paperwork today in Juneau to run for another term as governor. Chief of staff Jim Clark reportedly had the honor of running the paperwork down to the Division of Elections.

Talk in the halls of the Capitol is that Murkowski is entering the race just to keep his dreams of a natural gas pipeline alive. The thinking goes that he’ll stay in the race until he finalizes a deal with Exxon Mobil, BP and ConocoPhillips to build the mega project and then drop out before the July 5 withdrawal deadline. Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s a short item this Tuesday morning that mentions ConocoPhillips’ interest in being a participant in a Russian natural gas field (and, no, I haven’t converted cubic meters to cubic feet. All I can remember at this moment is that there are 39.37 inches in a plain ol’ meter, not the cubic kind):

MOSCOW—Russia’s state-controlled natural gas monopoly, Gazprom, will announce by August the names of foreign partners to help develop the massive Shtokman natural gas field in the Barents Sea, a Russian news agency reported Tuesday.

“(The partner companies) will be named in summer, by August,” Sergei Yemelyanov, general director of OAO Gazprom’s export division, Gazexport, was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying. “Two or three of the five (shortlisted candidates) will be selected.” Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s the latest news from Canada, via the CBC, regarding the Mackenzie Valley pipeline, the natural gas project in northwestern Canada that the Murkowski administration would like to see built before the Alaska project (a piece of info not mentioned in the story is that Exxon Mobil is the majority shareholder of Imperial Oil):

Imperial Oil abruptly cancelled negotiations for access and benefits agreements with the Dehgah Alliance last week.

A spokesman for Imperial says the company is unsure which communities the Dehgah Alliance represents.

The Dehgah Alliance Society was formed by Dehcho communities to negotiate access and benefits agreements with gas producers, but the Pehdzi Keh First Nation in Wrigley recently pulled out of the group. That leaves Fort Simpson, Jean Marie River and Kakisa as members. Read the rest of this entry »

JUNEAU—Former Alaska Gov. Tony Knowles said Monday that he will run for a new term.

In an interview with The Associated Press, the two-term Democrat invoked Alaska’s only three-term governor, fellow Democrat Bill Egan, who returned to office in 1970 for the final planning of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System.

“In that same spirit, I will make sure a natural gas pipeline is constructed,” Knowles said. “We will never again have to pray for another boom if we have the will and the strength to do this one right.”

Also Monday, House Minority Leader Ethan Berkowitz, D-Anchorage, said he would abandon his own gubernatorial campaign to run for lieutenant governor.

In Alaska, a person can serve a third term as governor if it does not immediately follow the previous two. Knowles was elected governor in 1994 and again in 1998.

In 2004, Knowles ran and lost against Republican Lisa Murkowski for the U.S. Senate seat that her father, Frank Murkowski, had vacated and appointed her to when he became governor in 2002.

Frank Murkowski announced on Friday that he will seek another term. Read the rest of this entry »