Dan Fauske, AGDC, ASAP, Alaska Instate Gas Pipeline, AGIATONIGHT!  Anchorage: January 25, 2012, 6:00pm – 8:00pm, Crowne Plaza, mid-town Anchorage at the corner of International Airport Road and C Street.  A project overview and update will be provided by Dan Fauske (NGP Photo) and members of the ASAP team will be present to answer Project questions.  The public is encouraged to attend and learn about the ASAP project. Refreshments will be served.

Comment: Today, Alaska Airlines Alaska Airlines Logoannounced it has unilaterally canceled its over three decade long tradition of providing prayer cards for meals.  It did not query its customers in general nor its ‘Gold’ members for their opinions.  One wonders if Alaska Air’s esteemed Alaska advisory groups weighed in.   Its reasoning lacks logic and common sense and could become a classic text book case of a marketing and public relations disaster, a ‘pr boomerang’.   (If it had only said, "We’re eliminating the prayer card because to counterbalance rising fuel costs we were forced to cut many non-essential operational expenses like this," the management would have at least had the appearance of honesty.)   Here is a link.   Here is a link to the Alaska Air Prayer Face Book page established several years ago by Pastor Kent Redfern, Muldoon Community Assembly (NGP Photo)  -dh

ADN/AP.   Rep. Les Gara (NGP Photo) Introduces Oil Tax Bill. Les Gara, Alaska House of Representatives, Oil Taxes, ACES, HB 110 Oil companies would need to invest in Alaska before getting a tax break under legislation proposed by an Anchorage Democrat.The measure, HB231, would provide tax breaks for exploration in new fields, investing in processing facilities and increasing well-related expenditures.

ADN by Becky Bohrer.  House Speaker Mike Chenault and Rep. Mike Hawker see the bill as empowering the Alaska Gasline Development Corp., or AGDC, which is leading the effort to advance an in-state line. The measure, among other things, would incorporate three existing bills, including one establishing a fund for pipeline work.  Chenault and Hawker have supported an in-state line as a way to help meet energy needs in Alaska’s most populous region. Chenault, R-Nikiski, said this bill, HB9, would not sanction a project, but rather would allow AGDC to get to the sanctioning stage, the point at which the Legislature would say build it, or don’t.  Dan FauskeAlaska Governor Sean Parnell by Dave Harbour, Oil Taxes, AGDC, AGIA, ACES, OCS, State of the State, Alliance, AGDC president, said he’s hoping for sanctioning by 2015. The group is aiming for a year-long open season, or period of courting gas producers, seeking commitments, beginning next January. On this timeline, and assuming the project gets the go-ahead, the goal is for first gas in the fall of 2018.  This comes as Gov. Sean Parnell (NGP Photo) seeks to jump-start efforts to advance a major line that would carry gas from the North Slope to market.   *    See Dispatch Story by Alex DeMarban.  

 

Time Business: Michael Sivy The unlikely green alternative to the Keystone pipeline? Railroads  – Whichever side is right in this argument, one beneficiary is clear: Railroads. Quite simply, some of the oil that would have been moved through the pipeline will now have to go by tanker car. If oil is more expensive or less available in some places, that will encourage the use of low-sulfur coal. Either way, it means more hauling business for the Big Rails, especially Burlington Northern, now owned by Warren Buffett’s company Berkshire Hathaway.   (Comment:  this is the first of what I expect to be many articles defending cancelation of the Keystone XL pipeline.  The largest problem with rail, other than the sheer expense of hauling oil, is that the capacity to haul the sheer volume of heavy crude from Alberta in heated tank cars simply does not exist.  And when the more efficient, low cost solution of a pipeline to Texas is eventually approved, the new heated tank cars will no longer have product to carry. – AG)

CBC News: Pipeline only the start to supplying Asia, report says  – A new report prepared for the province by the University of Alberta’s China Institute suggests the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline will be only a first step in meeting the surging demand in Asian markets.

Reuters: Nichole Mordant and Jeffery Jones Ottawa sees itself as protector of oil sands benefits  – As about 50 protesters demonstrated noisily outside, Joe Oliver, minister of natural resources, said in Vancouver that "environmental and other radical groups" are indiscriminately opposing any and all large industrial projects and are using Canada’s regulatory system as their main battleground.  (Comment:  The action of continuing political battles in the courts and regulatory agencies by environmentalists has been called "lawfare.." – AG)

Wall Street Journal Market Watch: Bill Mann New route for Alberta oil: Northward?  – The Mackenzie, Slave and Athabasca Rivers could bring oil and pipeline equipment from the Arctic or Hudson Bay right into the heart of Alberta, where the oil sands are. There’s only one hitch — a series of four Slave River rapids up by the border of Alberta and the Northwest Territories.

 

The Hill: Obama speech steers clear of Keystone pipeline rejection, Solyndra failure  –  President Obama made no mention in his State of the Union address Tuesday of his decision to reject the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline or the federal loan guarantee to failed solar firm Solyndra.Obama rejected the pipeline last week under a GOP provision in December’s payroll tax cut law that required a decision on Keystone by Feb. 21. 

 
The Hill: Obama’s offshore drilling pledge re-states existing plan  –  President Obama’s State of the Union speech endorsed expanded offshore oil-and-gas drilling but didn’t alter existing administration plans that energy companies and Republicans complain are too narrow. Obama, in his speech, called for continued increases in U.S. oil production. “Over the last three years, we’ve opened millions of new acres for oil and gas exploration, and tonight, I’m directing my administration to open more than 75 percent of our potential offshore oil-and-gas resources,” Obama said in the Capitol.
 
AP: Natural gas price rebounding from 10-year low  –  Natural gas prices are rebounding from 10-year lows as producers cut back and colder weather forces homeowners to turn up the heat. The price of natural gas futures rose Tuesday for the third straight trading day, adding 3 cents to finish at $2.55 per 1,000 cubic feet. The futures contract dropped as low as $2.32 on Thursday, the lowest since Feb. 25, 2002.
 
Bloomberg: Obama Stance on Fossil Fuel Angers Industry  –  President Barack Obama is taking credit for higher U.S. oil and gas production and lower imports, angering industry groups and Republicans who say he is working against domestic energy production. American energy will be a major theme of Obama’s State of the Union address to Congress tonight, Jay Carney, the White House spokesman, said in a briefing yesterday.
 
In his final State of the Union address before the 2012 election, President Obama did not shy away from some of the same energy and environmental issues that Republicans have said would be among his greatest weaknesses this fall. Obama referenced both his stalled climate change initiative and the bankrupt Solyndra solar energy company last night while chiding Congress for inaction on a host of energy issues. 
 
President Obama made the case Tuesday night for producing more of the United States’ energy supplies domestically in pursuing an “all-of-the-above” approach to further bolster the economy and national security. Speaking to a joint session of Congress in his third State of the Union address, Obama called for policies that harness a mixture of fossil-fuel and alternative energy resources.
 
The Houston Chronicle: State Department official defends Keystone rejection  –  A top State Department official today will blast a Republican bill that would circumvent the administration’s denial of a permit for Keystone XL and hand approval of the pipeline to a different agency. Assistant Secretary of State Kerri-Ann Jones, the point person on Keystone XL, will defend her department’s rationale for recommending against a permit for the pipeline before a House panel, according to written testimony.
 
The Houston Chronicle: Big Oil had good 2011, despite 4th-quarter slump  –  After gangbuster results earlier in 2011, giant integrated energy companies are set to report lackluster fourth-quarter earnings starting Wednesday, and it has a lot to do with the price of oil in London. “The fourth quarter is going to be poor,” said Mark Gilman, an oil and gas analyst with the Benchmark Group. “The refining side is going to see very poor results.”