Finally, A Shovel-Ready Project....

... wow, this is quite a project. If I were younger, it might be worth moving to Alaska just to be part of it. A reader sent me the link to this very interesting Forbes article. Look at the scope of this project:

... the building of a new natural gas pipeline from the North Slope to the Kenai Peninsula south of Anchorage.

 The proposed pipeline project – in which the state, thanks to Governor Parnell and state legislators working in partnership with major oil and gas producers – will require about $45 billion in new investment (about seven times the cost of the equally important mid-continent Keystone XL project) and include not just the pipeline itself but harbors, roads, and state-of-the-art facilities to liquefy the gas for shipping to points south.

 This project – in part spurred by the oil and gas tax reform measures recently passed by the state legislature – would finally allow the tapping of the more than 8 TRILLION cubic feet of gas (one of the world’s largest reserves) in the Point Thompson section of the North Slope.

 The economics of the project are obvious – $2-3 billion more per year in additional revenues for the state, thousands of permanent (and temporary construction – if you call a decade “temporary”) jobs, and a more independent, reliable, and cost-effective energy production system for the United States.

It still boggles the mind that the US government halted Keystone XL 2.0 North over a bit of real estate in Nebraska that is no longer an issue.  One thing Mr Obama is good at: delays.