President Trump is credited with helping advance Alaska’s long sought gas pipeline project. Alaska Gasline Development Corporation president Keith Meyer told the Fairbanks Chamber of Commerce yesterday that Trump administration goals dovetail with selling North Slope gas to Asia.
”We’re really getting a good reception in Washington and it’s largely because we have a project that fits very well with the administration goals of trade and infrastructure and energy export,” Meyer said.
Meyer says AGDC is spending a lot of time in Washington working with Whitehouse and agency officials on the estimated $43 billion Alaska gas line project.
“And so we sort of, when we’re in Washington, brand this as America’s large energy infrastructure project,” Meyer said.
Meyer credits President Trump’s relationship with Chinese president Xi JinPing with helping grow interest in Alaska gas, pointing specifically to an April 2017 meeting.
”In that meeting at Mar-a-Lago, Florida, President Trump, because of the work we’d done in Washington, mentioned Alaska LNG,” Meyer said.
Meyer says that lead to Xi and other Chinese officials visiting Alaska, and Governor Walker signing an agreement with China to explore a financial backing for gas line capacity deal.
”And so this really sets now our course, a lot of our focus for 2018, to finalize the definitive agreements for this relationship,” Meyer said.
Noting that the state additionally has MOU’s to buy Alaska natural gas, with Vietnam, Korea and Japan, Meyer says a lot of paperwork has to be processed. He does not anticipate final decisions by China and other buyers and investors until 2019.
Dan Bross is a reporter at KUAC in Fairbanks.
