Legislature(2001 - 2002)
03/13/2002 03:40 PM Senate NGP
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* first hearing in first committee of referral
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= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
ALASKA LEGISLATURE
JOINT COMMITTEE ON NATURAL GAS PIPELINES
March 13, 2002
3:40 p.m.
SENATE MEMBERS PRESENT
Senator John Torgerson, Chair
Senator Johnny Ellis
Senator Don Olson (Alternate)
SENATE MEMBERS ABSENT
Senator Rick Halford
Senator Pete Kelly
HOUSE MEMBERS PRESENT
Representative Brian Porter
Representative Scott Ogan
Representative John Davies
Representative Reggie Joule (Alternate)
HOUSE MEMBERS ABSENT
Representative Joe Green, Vice Chair
OTHER LEGISLATORS PRESENT
Senator Ben Stevens
Senator Gary Wilken
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
Energy Council Report
ACTION NARRATIVE
TAPE 02-5, SIDE A
Number 001
CHAIRMAN JOHN TORGERSON called the Joint Committee on Natural Gas
Pipelines meeting to order at 3:40 p.m. and announced the committee
would first hear a brief overview of the Energy Council trip to
Washington D.C. by Representative Ogan.
REPRESENTATIVE OGAN told members the Energy Council meeting was a
very valuable meeting to attend. The chairman of the Federal Energy
Regulatory Commission (FERC), Mr. Wood, addressed the Council. He
asked Mr. Wood whether or not FERC would be willing to work with
the Regulatory Commission of Alaska (RCA) and the possibility of
the RCA having a seat at the table. Mr. Wood responded that he's a
good friend of Nan Thompson, the Chair of the RCA, and he would be
more than happy to work with her. He said that FERC plans to hold a
meeting in Alaska.
He said that two other people expressed some concerns over the
Knowles-Daschle announcement of a floor for the price of gas. He
said [the announcement] may have been premature and it galvanized
opposition from states that produce gas in the Lower 48.
REPRESENTATIVE OGAN said that the highlight of the Energy Council
meeting for him was the keynote address at the Energy Council
luncheon by Senator Bingaman, Chair of the Senate Energy and
Resources Committee. He had a short debate with Senator Bingaman
about ANWR as the energy bill had not been given a Senate Resources
Committee referral because Senator Murkowski had the votes to pass
ANWR on the committee. He surmised, "Apparently, the only thing
they could do was filibuster the bill; they couldn't filibuster the
ANWR issue if it was already on the floor."
REPRESENTATIVE OGAN said he pointed out that Alaska has six times
as many caribou on the North Slope now than when oil development
began, that Alaska exports its environmental technology all over
the world, and that it has developed only 2,000 acres at the end of
the day. He stated, "We cannot conserve our way out of our
dependency on foreign oil...."
He said that Democrats in the Senate were talking about requiring
20% more efficiency in oil consumption and that the U.S. has
accomplished only 2%. Twenty percent would be almost impossible to
obtain with current technology. He was also told that the people
who blew up the World Trade Center were partially funded by money
from oil that is imported into the U.S. and that developing ANWR is
a national security issue. He was told that the Gulf of Mexico is
an alternative source, but he thought that was a mature field.
REPRESENTATIVE OGAN told members that industry experts said there
would be a 43% increase in the demand for power in the next 20
years and natural gas is expected to meet those increases. Nuclear
and coal industry experts presented their plans with the coal
industry looking for a way to gasify the coal to make it clean-
burning, but the technology is a ways off. He learned that there
was an increase in the output of nuclear generated power although
there are no new plants or permits. They just tweak what they've
got.
He said that everyone was concerned about the outcome of ANWR
because it wasn't going to go through a committee process. He heard
the thing that drove action on the energy bill was the Enron issue.
One person talked about the subsurface being dominant [and] giving
surface owners more say in exploration.
REPRESENTATIVE OGAN continued to say that Representatives Joule and
Kookesh met with democratic senators on behalf of Alaska Natives
who desire to see ANWR opened to development. He concluded that it
was a very valuable trip and related some personal experiences with
his family.
REPRESENTATIVE DAVIES gave the following responses to some of the
issues Representative Ogan discussed:
The issue of politics and pulling the bill - clearly that
happens. The Republican majority leader not too many
months ago did exactly the same thing. But the issue of
the floor - Senator Murkowski has already raised that in
public. People already know about that - that's not a new
discussion. John Katz observed that you're not going to
get an issue that has that kind of significant financial
impact through the dark of the night. It's going to be an
issue that's going to be discussed one way or the other.
With respect to conservation, it's absolutely true that
democrats are working hard for conservation. That doesn't
mean that they're not also working for development of
resources. So, I resent that comparison or insinuation
the democrats are only working for conservation. Clearly
they are, but they see many other avenues as viable as
well. It certainly is true that conservation is extremely
significant. A quite doable conservation goal could
equivalently produce what would come out of ANWR. That is
not to say that we shouldn't do ANWR or shouldn't do
development, but it's also to say that it's extremely
important and shouldn't be off the table.
CHAIRMAN TORGERSON said the three deal killers are CAFÉ standards,
which are the conservation measures (Democrats and Republicans are
all over the board on that one), the nuclear power issue and the
electric 'derestructuring' (they want to regulate it again), and
ANWR. He explained:
They look at whatever we're going to send down there, 4.5
- 5 Bs of gas, as a stabilizing effect on the market, so
the market may not grow. Of course, they have a dog in
that fight, because they sell the product, but so do the
producers.
CHAIRMAN TORGERSON said that a month ago Legislative Council
approved additional funds for the committee to hire a tax attorney
and he then had it broadened to include bond counsel, since the
Alaska Railroad tax-exempt bonds became an issue. He reported that
today was the last day for people to respond to his RFP. He sent
out five and three came back non-responsive because of conflicts.
He said they would look at two bids later today. One is from
Ballard, Spear and Andrews in Washington D.C. and the other is from
Hogan and Harston, our current lawyers in Washington D.C. who have
a large tax division in their operation, too.
REPRESENTATIVE OGAN moved to recess the regular meeting to go into
executive session under Rule 22(b)(1), "Finances of the State...,"
to hear from the state's attorney in Washington D.C. There were no
objections and it was so ordered at 3:52 p.m.
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