Sarah Palin’s Gas Pipeline
From Investors Business Daily, earlier this month (before Sarah Palin was even on any VP speculation lists):
As congressional Democrats dither on a vote for oil drilling, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has pushed through a gas pipeline project to bring new supply and price relief to the lower 48.
On Aug. 1, the same day the call for a vote on drilling began on the House floor, the Alaska state Senate approved a package of measures to license a new natural gas pipeline. House Bill 3001 lets Palin award the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act license to TransCanada Alaska, a pipeline builder that cast a winning bid of five.
The legislature had been trying for 30 years to authorize something like this and, up until now, had blown it. Palin got it through. Getting it off the ground, the state says, will be the biggest construction project in U.S. history.
(Read more after the leap)
Palin considers the $26 billion project her biggest accomplishment as governor. “It was not easy,” she told IBD. “Alaska has been hoping and dreaming for a natural gas pipeline for decades. What it took was getting off the dime and creating a competitive market in Alaska.”
Minus a pipeline, Alaska’s abundant gas largely ends up pumped back into the ground to be used to pressurize oil fields and aid in extraction. With oil production in Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay region declining and Congress continuing to drag its feet on new oil drilling, one of the few things Alaska can do is sell some of the gas now.
The new supply could bring price relief to anyone who uses home heating, electricity, farm fertilizers or manufactured goods in the U.S. “Not only is this economical for all players involved; it’s wildly needed,” said Palin.
“We still have so much to do — to break ground, to build,” she said. “We’ll keep ramping up oil production, educating Congress to allow ANWR to be tapped and to prove we can ethically and responsibly drill so Alaska can produce for everyone. Alaska should be the head, not the tail, to the energy solution.”
Small wonder, then, that Alaska has one popular governor. If only congressional Democrats could also get off the dime.
So, let’s review…
Alaska has lots of natural gas.
The lower 48 have a big need for natural gas.
Alaska has the (presently unrealized) potential to eventually produce upward of 2 trillion cubic feet of natural gas a year. US demand for natural gas is at 23 trillion cubic feet a year and climbing, so Alaska could meet anywhere from seven to eight percent of current US natural gas demand (let alone natural gas that might come from expanded drilling at new sites).
A natural gas pipeline connecting Alaska to the lower 48 would be the biggest construction project in U.S. history (which is something for a project that would in part run through Canada, but I digress).
Alaska has been trying to start building such a pipeline for 30 years, and couldn’t get started.
Sarah Palin succeeded in doing just that (negotiations had stalled before she entered office).
And the pre-Palin bidding process to build the pipeline was not very competitive; it was too friendly to “big oil” (the Democrat rhetorical villain of late).
Palin eventually came down in favor of an independent bid, precisely because it would free Alaska from being so reliant exclusively on the big oil companies.
She even signed the legislation at the convention of the Alaska AFL-CIO (lots of union jobs in building that pipeline).
As the pipeline runs through Canada, negotiations were also required with Canadian authorities; this, ironically, gives Palin more actual hands-on foreign policy experience than Barack Obama (or, really for that matter, Joe Biden). Obama’s only experience in dealing with Canada has been to privately tell diplomats from the Canadian government that he didn’t really mean his talk about repealing NAFTA, and that he was just politically pandering.
And while one shouldn’t overstate the importance of Palin’s discussions with the Canadian government (or any of her other experience, such as running the Alaska National Guard, for example), the fact that such discussions give her more foreign policy experience (and experience in numerous other areas) than Barack Obama, who sits at the top of the opposite ticket, should be enough to give any serious voter pause about pulling the lever for the Democratic candidate.
Another rhetorical arrow–”big oil”–gone from the Democrat quiver, it seems, and another example of Palin’s actual executive experience in getting stuff done (more experience, it must be noted, than Barack Obama and Joe Biden combined; more pausing for serious voters with respect to Obama), negotiating with a foreign government and even creating union jobs in the process.
September 1st, 2008 at 10:00 am
Excellent!
This is the kind of thing that we need to keep bringing out–and then comparing to Obama to show that our VP candidate has better experience than their Presidential candidate.
AND actually doing things to HELP the energy situation.
September 2nd, 2008 at 8:15 pm
[...] corrupt, and that Republicans were evil, and she was going to just mix everything up and get us a gas pipeline and end of story. And she got to power, she was elected overwhelmingly by independents, beat Tony [...]
September 3rd, 2008 at 7:36 am
[...] corrupt, and that Republicans were evil, and she was going to just mix everything up and get us a gas pipeline and end of story. And she got to power, she was elected overwhelmingly by independents, beat Tony [...]
September 3rd, 2008 at 2:49 pm
[...] corrupt, and that Republicans were evil, and she was going to just mix everything up and get us a gas pipeline and end of story. And she got to power, she was elected overwhelmingly by independents, beat Tony [...]
September 3rd, 2008 at 3:43 pm
spammed?
September 3rd, 2008 at 3:59 pm
Those are being linked by another site. It’s good stuff.
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:06 pm
The natural gas pipeline was rejected by the Alaskan legislature for 30 years for a reason. I invest heavily in energy. I prefer gas (US & Canadian) to oil because I believe the future is in gas.
However, the Lower 48 has an abundance of natural gas & we have pipelines already built. We do not need Alaskan natural gas. We also already have deals with Canadian producers with the prices hedged for years to come.
So, what we have is the most expensive construction job ever… for a product we don’t really need. Who owns TransCanada? Hopefully, by the time we do need Alaskan gas, we won’t be relying on any fossil fuels.
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:24 pm
I just looked it up. TransCanada, who won the contract to build Gov. Palin’s pipelin, is a Canadian company, based in Calgary… Not even a US company… & the reason the project was on the back-burner for 30 years was because gas prices were too low to make it feasible. For it to remain feasible, natural gas prices must remain high.
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:37 pm
I think the reason for the pipeline is more for Alaska than it is for the gas/oil companies. And the reason for the selection of the Canadian company was because they had the best competitive bid.
In other words, they did the best for their State. It will probably end up helping the lower 48 in the process.
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Palin wouldn’t be a very responsible governor of Alaska if she continued to allow that natural gas to be wasted or to just sit in the ground, given growing demand for natural gas and the price of it making the extraction of it profitable.
September 4th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
I’ve been reading a little more about the pipeline.
1. Construction has not begun & may never begin. As the tundra thaws from the Arctic’s rising temperatures, the pipelines we already have are becoming unstable & sinking into the new bogs.
2. What was issued was not a contract to build, but a $500 million license, which is an “incentive” to TransCanada to begin to investigate how to build the pipeline.
3. The route for the pipeline is to be determined by the Alaskan legislature. To me that sounds like the old cliche, “A camel is a horse designed by a committee.” Plus, there are Canadian objections. Canada may not approve any route.
So, TransCanada, a foreign company, gets $500 million for pretty much doing nothing.
However, another thing that I’ve found in reading about the pipeline. I was actually thinking of investing when I first started looking.
We all know that Sen. McCain is hostile to “earmarks”… doubtless Gov. Palin will now echo his comments. However, while mayor of Wasilla, she hired a lobbiest in Washington to gain earmarks for Wasilla & over the years gained $27 million for a town of 6700. This is the greatest $$$ per capita of earmarks for any town or city in the US. She earned the title “Queen of the Earmarks in the Earmark State.” She supported the “Bridge to Nowhere” until it became known as the “Bridge to Nowhere.”
BTW… I was for the Bridge to Nowhere… because it was not to nowhere. It was from Ketchican, which is a major stop for cruise ships, to the island where Ketchican’s airport is. Ketchican is accessible only by water & air. However, in winter the port & the strait between Ketchican & the island become very dangerous. So, in winter, the airport, used to supply the town, can be cut off from the town of Ketchican. The only solution is a bridge over a very dangerous strait…. much as the only way across the Golden Gate is a very expensive bridge.
September 4th, 2008 at 7:18 pm
[...] Sarah Palin can negotiate the largest construction project in US history, where everyone else has failed for 30 years, she is certainly qualified for an executive position [...]
September 4th, 2008 at 7:45 pm
Sources, Scholastica8. Sources. My interpretation of the $500 million license is that they are not guaranteeing the total contract to TransCanada, but insisting that they provide a design for the pipeline. As you might guess, this is an excessively expensive endeavor. So it is not an “incentive”, but rather payment for the first phase–i.e. design. It is certain not for “nothing”.
Who gave Mayor Palin the title “Queen of the Earmarks in the Earmark State” (not very catchy)? It is strange that a Mayor can get that title since earmarks are made by Representatives and Senators.
I’m glad you are such a savvy investor. But that is largely irrelevant for your argument. You are basically using that as a method to make yourself sound like you know something. But what you really look like is a Obama shill.
September 5th, 2008 at 9:31 pm
I am curious. How can a State enter into a legal contract with a foreign country. I sort of believe the U>S> Government has to deal with Canada on where the pipeline should go. Sounds as if the govenor is only getting a information contract from a Canadian company
September 6th, 2008 at 11:14 am
Actually they did not enter into a contract with a foreign country. It took a bit of digging to figure out the details. What I had read before was that the pipeline was to bring natural gas from the North Slope to America through Canada–and that is true. But the pipeline in Canada does not have to be built. It already exists and it owned/run by TransCanada.
So the negotiation was not with Canada, but rather a Canadian firm.
More info at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26550336/
September 10th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
Finally, something substantial…The other day, I almost died when McCain said “Alaska is in close proximity to Russia, so this gives her foreign policy experience”. McCain is making me wish I was a Democrat. Okay, not really, but still…he’s making us all look like fools. I’ll be shocked if we actually win this one.
September 25th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
Aboriginal people have been kicked in the ass for too long. The pipline is a good idea but you need to include aboriginal people from the start. If the project is going on their land, they should have a say in the matter. Also, many of the jobs should go to aboriginal people in the area to raise their standard of living. It is wrong of you Sarah not giving these people the respect they deserve. This is not the way to do business.
September 25th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
In the interest of full disclosure, the aforementioned comment came from a Chicago IP address; make of that what you will.