Next round of LNG project reports to FERC: expected to start late spring.

• Author: Persily, Larry
• Position: SPECIAL SECTION: Oil & Gas

(This update, provided by the Kenai Peninsula Borough mayor's office, is part of an ongoing effort to help keep the public informed about the Alaska LNG project.)

Alaska LNG plans to start submitting the project's second round of draft "resource reports" to federal regulators in late spring, running into July before the last of the thirteen environmental and engineering reports will be turned in to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and available to the public.

The first reports will be the general project description (Resource Report No. 1) and alternatives (No. 10), according to minutes of meetings held between Alaska LNG and FERC officials in January. The other eleven reports-including soils, air quality, water quality, community impacts and safety "are anticipated to be submitted on a staggered schedule between May and July," according to the meeting notes filed in FERC's public docket.

Though weak global LNG (liquefied natural gas) markets have called into question whether the Alaska project will proceed to the next level of engineering and design spending in 2017, the partners have said they remain committed to finishing their preliminary work this year and preparing the reports for submittal to FERC. Though not as much as last year, Alaska LNG project teams and their contractors will be back in the field this year for onshore and offshore work as they collect more data for regulators and their own design and decision needs.

The partners-North Slope producers ExxonMobil, BP, and ConocoPhillips, and the state of Alaska-spent almost $500 million from 2012 through 2015, including three summers of field work. The partners approved a work plan of more than $200 million for this year. The projects full budget, through construction, was estimated in 2012 at $45 billion to $65 billion for producing as much as 20 million metric tons of LNG per year (about 2.5 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day).

Complete Project Description

Despite its title, the general project description of Report No. 1 will weigh in at several thousand pages--including maps--giving the public the most detailed look to date at where and how the Point Thomson-to-Prudhoe Bay gas pipeline, North Slope gas treatment plant, Prudhoe Bay-to-Nikiski pipeline, and LNG plant and marine terminal at Nikiski would be built.

The other filing expected in late spring, Report No. 10, is required to set out alternatives to the project--discussing the other options for moving North Slope gas to market. Discussing alternatives is required for every federal environmental impact statement (EIS), and Alaska LNG is no exception.

One option long championed by many Alaskans would be to route the pipeline to Valdez...