Alaska Senate Majority sets Anchorage press availability on stalled gas session

Alaska's fourth special session on gas pipeline taxation has produced no votes in two weeks, leaving lawmakers and pipeline backers without a clear path forward. Senate Majority members are scheduled to take questions from reporters Monday at 1pm at the Anchorage Legislative Information Office on the status of the session and the Alaska gas pipeline, according to an advisory from Noah Hanson, communications director for the Senate Majority.

The stakes behind the standoff are a looming supply crunch. Cook Inlet gas production has fallen from more than 300 billion cubic feet a year in the 1990s to between 60 and 70 billion cubic feet today, and state officials expect the supply to run out by the mid-2030s. Hilcorp's gas supply contract for ENSTAR is set to end in 2033.

Alaska News previously covered the Senate's opening of the fourth special session in Juneau on July 27, a technical session at which members heard the governor's proclamation and learned the House had killed HB 381. The House met briefly Friday and adjourned by unanimous consent until Tuesday at 10:30am for another technical session.

An assessment by Wood Mackenzie for the Alaska Gasline Development Corporation projects about 2,271 construction jobs and 1,138 operations jobs for the 765-mile Phase 1 line. Senate Majority Leader Cathy Giessel, speaking at a Commonwealth North forum on June 5, addressed impact funding. "We feel strongly that all the communities, all the Alaskans in our state should benefit from this pipeline," she said.

The bill has drawn opposition on consumer-protection grounds. The Alaska Public Interest Research Group has told the Senate Finance Committee it opposes HB 381 as written, arguing it lacks sufficient consumer protections, transparency requirements and guaranteed funding to decommission the pipeline down the line. The group also warns that the Glenfarne-ENSTAR contract's advertised $16 per MMBtu gas price could prove misleading once conversions, inflation escalators and volume requirements are factored in, and that the Regulatory Commission of Alaska is too understaffed to oversee a project this large.