SENATE RESOURCES  JANUARY 28, 2026  3:30 P.M.  INITIAL VERSION DRAFT  FOR  BILLS AND PRESENTATIONS GERMANE TO 2ND SPECIAL  SESSION  MEMBERS PRESENT  Senator Cathy Giessel, Chair Senator Bill Wielechowski, Vice Chair Senator Matt Claman Senator Forrest Dunbar Senator Scott Kawasaki Senator Robert Myers Senator George Rauscher MEMBERS ABSENT  All members present COMMITTEE CALENDAR  PRESENTATION(S): IMPACTS FROM A GAS PIPELINE PROJECT~ DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION AND PUBLIC FACILITIES (DOTPF) - HEARD SENATE BILL NO. 180 "An Act relating to the regulation of liquefied natural gas import facilities by the Regulatory Commission of Alaska." - SCHEDULED BUT NOT HEARD PREVIOUS COMMITTEE ACTION  No previous action to report. WITNESS REGISTER  RYAN ANDERSON, Commissioner Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF) Fairbanks, Alaska POSITION STATEMENT: Co-presented: Impacts from a Gas Pipeline Project, Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF) KATHERINE KEITH, Deputy Commissioner Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF) Anchorage, Alaska POSITION STATEMENT: Co-presented: Impacts from a Gas Pipeline Project, Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF) ACTION NARRATIVE  3:30:10 PM CHAIR GIESSEL called the Senate Resources Standing Committee meeting to order at 3:30 p.m. Present at the call to order were Senators Dunbar, Rauscher, Kawasaki, Myers, Wielechowski and Chair Giessel. Senator Claman arrived shortly thereafter. ^PRESENTATION(S): IMPACTS FROM A GAS PIPELINE PROJECT, DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION AND PUBLIC FACILITIES (DOTPF) PRESENTATION(S): IMPACTS FROM A GAS PIPELINE PROJECT, DEPARTMENT  OF TRANSPORTATION AND PUBLIC FACILITIES (DOTPF)  3:30:48 PM CHAIR GIESSEL announced the presentation: Impacts from a Gas Pipeline Project, Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF). 3:31:12 PM RYAN ANDERSON, Commissioner, Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF), Fairbanks, Alaska, said (DOTPF) is involved in a lot of resource and development issues across the state. He explained that the presentation was like one delivered to the LNG caucus over the summer but updated, to give the committee the latest and greatest on how they are approaching the potential of an Alaska gas line. 3:32:06 PM SENATOR CLAMAN joined the meeting. 3:32:16 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON introduced Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF) personnel available in person and on-line to answer questions. 3:32:51 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON moved to slide 2. He reflected that Alaska had historically been built through significant transportation- driven events, citing the gold rush, World War II and the ALCAN Highway, and the development of TAPS and the Dalton Highway as major milestones. Drawing on his experience managing the northern region, he emphasized the importance of maintaining infrastructure that supports key economic assets for the state. He described the proposed Alaska LNG pipeline route, noting it would start at Prudhoe Bay, follow the Dalton Highway to Livengood, then diverge cross-country rather than following the Elliott Highway through Fairbanks, reconnecting near Nenana. From there, it would track along the Parks Highway before again going overland south of the Chulitna River Bridge and ultimately passing under Cook Inlet.: [Original punctuation provided.] LNG Transportation Corridor  What's at Stake for Alaska World-Class Transportation Infrastructure: Supporting Alaska's LNG Gasline [Map of the proposed AKLNG pipeline and existing infrastructure: International Airports Rural Airport Hubs Tunnels Ports National Highway System Railroad Trans Alaska Pipeline Proposed Alaska LNG Line Marine Routes COMMISSIONER ANDERSON highlighted that the AKLNG project would involve significant transportation considerations, including hauling, trucking, and commercial vehicle activity, as well as construction where the pipeline intersects or passes beneath highways. He noted that DOTPF was focused on these impacts, including material sites and access to the highway system, and had been coordinating with Glenfarne to understand project planning and logistics. 3:35:38 PM CHAIR GIESSEL noted the marine route indicated on the map. She asked whether that reflected an expectation of off-shore export of gas or why the marine route was included on the map. 3:35:50 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON said the intent was to show alternate routes for transporting materials. He noted that there may be limited barge opportunities to Prudhoe Bay. He added that DOTPF were proud to have secured a Maritime Administration (MARAD) marine route designation, which made ports, including some river-connected communities, eligible for federal infrastructure funding. 3:36:59 PM SENATOR RAUSCHER asked whether it was possible that materials for the pipeline could travel by barge. 3:37:16 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON said he had not seen detailed logistical plans. He said shipping some materials through Prudhoe Bay is a possibility. 3:37:45 PM KATHERINE KEITH, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF), Anchorage, Alaska, moved to slide 3: [Original punctuation provided.] Highway Safety and Alaska DOT&PF  Organization Alaska Department of Transportation & Public Facilities Structure  Commissioner Deputy Commissioner STRATEGIC ASSETS  • Alaska International Airport System • Alaska Marine Highway System • Statewide Equipment Fleet • Division of Facilities • Measurement Standards & Commercial Vehicle Compliance MS. KEITH: Despite the fact that we're in a very different regulatory environment than we were in the [19]70s when the trans-Alaska pipeline (TAPS) was constructed, there are certainly things that we can learn from that and how we have to operate as an organization in order to best support construction of the pipeline. You see on the slide here, it's a high level, a bit more of a graphical representation of our department, but it does capture how we operate as a teamed resource pool across all of the different aspects of what DOT does. This has developed over the years that we've been in these roles with DOT, but in this more agile framework, it will help to be able to adapt to the changing needs. As we understand the constructability plans of 8 Star [Alaska, LLC], as this develops, we'll be able to, through a flexible structure, adapt to the needs. Some of the requirements of the [AK] LNG line, it certainly may be compounded by other concurrent development in the state, for example, construction of the [Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment] BEAD, the broadband energy infrastructure and several other larger scale construction which is going to task our workforce and our staff, whether it's through permitting or engineering reviews. So, these are things that we're being mindful of and trying to establish Tasks Force and systems right now so that as we go forward over the next couple of years, that we're prepared. We look at our department from a couple different lenses. One is through strategic assets. These are things that we consider highly used infrastructure that provides this critical value back to the state, including our Alaska International Airport system in Fairbanks and Anchorage, our Alaska Marine Highway System, our division of facilities, public facilities, our statewide equipment fleet and MSCVC - measurement standards and commercial vehicle compliance. And that particular division is important, because that's what's going to help ensure that the heavy traffic on our roads, heavy duty vehicles, are compliant, because as we do move forward with the increased use of our highways and other modes of transportation, the public safety, highway safety is going to remain paramount, and that is a role that the Department of Transportation does play, both in constructing solutions to increase public safety, pull outs, for example, but then also the non-infrastructure related improvements, which we'll talk about a little bit about using digital tools such as Alaska 511, to help increase awareness of where activity is occurring. With our cross functional support, this is how our department is structured, with a data modernization and innovation office, program management and administration, our new Alaska trails and local access systems to help provide support with rural project development and logistics. These are examples of how we have different parts of the department which support our regions where you see project delivery and construction occur. With the development of the pipeline, and as it gets underway, we are expecting thousands of heavy-duty trucks carrying 80-foot long pipe segments. These are going to be convoys, potentially overweight, oversized vehicles, and so, this early planning will help us be able to accommodate the needs for construction but keeping safety at the forefront. 3:41:51 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON Just one thing about this structure: over time, DOT has responded to a lot of events over the past few years, the latest being Typhoon Halong on the west coast of Alaska. One thing we've learned is when there's an event, it really takes resources from across the state to respond the way Alaskans expect us to respond. And so, as you see our structures, when we get into the AK LNG pipeline, it's an event, and so we want to treat it like that. 3:42:24 PM MS. KEITH It's not just resources within our own agency, it's other statewide departments and agencies and corporations as well, the Alaska Railroad Corporation, [Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority] AIDEA, these groups we are coordinating with on a quite regular basis to help put the pieces together to best support the project as we move forward. 3:42:53 PM SENATOR CLAMAN The slide describes the Northern, Central and Southcoast Regions. I know there's been a lot of press and a lot of discussion about consolidating DOT and not having the three separate regions, and specific to the pipeline, does that shift from having three regions and management in three regions? Should we be concerned about not maintaining the three regions in terms of maintaining DOT facilities with a potentially large project like this? 3:43:28 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON That's a great question. One of the things we've been doing over the past year is really looking at where we've had success and we've been listening a lot, for example, with several of the contracting organizations. Consistency in the way we operate is a theme for DOT, where we've heard a lot about, in one region, things are done a certain way; in another region, they're done another way. And we really need to get things consistent across the state, and technology accelerates that because you have more ways to do that. The communication tools are, people are communicating across the world now and in different ways. But with what we're looking at with our budget proposal, it's a leadership shift. The regions still stay intact. We're not bringing people, breaking things up there. What we're trying to do is shift from regional directors in each region that would do all capital maintenance and operations, this full gamut, to having a maintenance and operations director that would look across the state at maintenance and just be dedicated to maintenance and operations, and then a capital program director that would be dedicated to capital across the state. The construct of the regions - we have engineers that are in the regions that aren't really affected by this change. It's the leadership [structure change] that we're proposing. 3:45:08 PM MS. KEITH moved to slide 4, Highway Assets & Conditions, Readiness for Increased Freight and Construction Traffic. As part of our lead-up in understanding the cost, what it may take to shore up our infrastructure to withstand construction and all of the heavy truck usage, we've been evaluating our assets across the state. We do this already through our Transportation Asset Management Program. This allows us to collect all sorts of data on our national highway system bridges and our pavement condition, and through these measures, allows us to understand if we are meeting our requirements. We are required to maintain our national highway system in a certain operating condition. And right now, we do. Of course, some sections of road and some bridges, as we know, are better than others. We're focused on, through this work, identifying what areas are most in need of improvements, and looking at our next four-year project delivery plan, which you'll see coming up in our Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP). Our STIP will be released for the public in the next couple weeks, and that'll show the four year construction plan. Being able to look at the data with where our infrastructure is and then being able to incorporate those needs into our capital program will help the developers and the public and decision-makers look at where these investments are happening, and through this public comment period that you'll see with our STIP, it'll help. We'll have a lot of opportunities for feedback and comment on that construction plan. Through that, I can talk briefly about the Dalton [Highway] because, as most of you will know, with 414 miles, about 250 of them are gravel, and we have had significant amount of construction activity. Between 2015 and 2025 we've had about $460 million invested in major construction projects. Over the next five or six years, we're planning an additional $450 [million] more. And it's certainly been seen in recent years that there are high amounts of washouts and emergency erosion mitigation work that we have to do. So, we're identifying potential ways that we could be more responsive when that does happen, so we don't have the Dalton shut down for two days or more. One example of that is working with Federal Highways Administration to get approval to stockpile material and have it at the known corridor sections that we know are at high risk. We can now be able to stockpile material, which would allow us to move quickly when a wash out does occur, which typically has not been very easy because there's a long distance between material locations. 3:48:31 PM SENATOR MYERS You're talking about large scale construction projects on the Dalton, and I will never question you when you tell me that you need to replace a bridge. That sounds dangerous, but my question is, what are we talking about in terms of maintenance on the Dalton? Because it's my understanding, with some information I've gotten from your department over the last few months, that we're spending only about $20 million a year to maintain that road, which is a very busy road. Well, busy, it's a very important road. We'll put it that way - not only for energy from within the state, but also, how we make our money here in the legislature, too. What kind of changes are we looking at in terms of daily maintenance on the haul road? 3:49:25 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON $20 million is about right for our standard operating budget; our folks also use those preventative maintenance funds. We leverage those as much as we can, which adds to that. But there are only certain things you can do with federal funds in terms of maintenance. A lot of it is, you put down the calcium with some aggregate; we're hopeful that this idea of stockpiling materials, they've been working with us on that, which would allow us to have that option for maintenance activities. Preventative maintenance is what we would call it. So, there's one there. Last year, the legislature reduced our operating budgets by about $5.5 million, and so we're constantly looking around, doing the best we can, with the reductions that have been occurring. We're doing our best there. I think in the governor's fiscal plan, we had the pipeline corridor maintenance fund. That's a real opportunity, I believe, for the Dalton Highway. That would add these funds. Years ago, I think it was before 2010, there would be a fairly sizable appropriation of state funds for heavy maintenance on the Dalton. And our teams at that time made the most of those and you saw some [of] the projects that the trucking industry is looking for, those "rebuilding the road and getting a good surface on it" type projects. When we get into the federal projects, the way we look at those is a little different. They're bigger projects and we don't get them done as fast as people are hoping. 3:51:10 PM SENATOR MYERS If you wouldn't mind a little attitude, I guess my big question, and I've expressed this to you and some other folks up in Northern Region, is just about getting, especially in summertime, I think in the wintertime, you guys generally do a pretty good job, but especially in summertime, getting operators and graders. I understand. We've got to respond to washouts and things like that. Those are important too. But just getting operators and graders out there is a basic function, and I don't think we're doing a very good job of it. How do you feel? 3:51:43 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON If you talk to our teams, what they're going to tell you, because our budget up there is limited [to] approximately $20 million, they're having to use those preventative maintenance funds to make the year, to get a full year. And so, that requires us to move to those types of eligible activities that we can do with those preventative maintenance funds, which aren't the daily grading - those types of activities that the trucking industry is looking for. That's where we've been having a lot of discussions. If we had this much additional funds, these are the types of things that we could do. But right now the current budget only goes so far. 3:52:29 PM SENATOR MYERS If I could just have a smidge of latitude here, I want to paint a picture of the issue that we're dealing with here. Trucks are going up that road. Things are getting beat up because of all the potholes and the washboard and everything that we're dealing with. Freight gets damaged. That means that you're either having to fix it on site or order replacements that increase costs. It delays projects. It could delay the gas line. As one example, [indisc] have been dealing with it with Pikka and Willow [Oil Projects] lately, but other stuff too. When you're talking about things that are occurring on the oil field, those become lease expenditures, which then get deducted off of our taxes. Can you trace any $1 of lease expenditure to what's happened on the Dalton? No, but we know where the mechanism is. And so, if we don't provide DOT the money that we need to maintain it, not just these construction projects, but daily maintenance, we're going to be missing out on tax dollars. On the other side of it, vehicles are getting damaged. Insurance rates go up, maintenance goes up. Those costs get passed along. Those then become cost overruns for the projects - more potential delays. And, just as an example, with the company I've been working with since 2020, our freight rates to haul a load up the Dalton have doubled in six years. Some of that is wages, some of that's fuel, but a large portion of that can be traced back to insurance and maintenance costs because of the condition of the road up there. So, those are the things that we're dealing with. And I know that we like to focus on the high dollar - how do we leverage our federal highway money and things like that. But if that's what we focus on, and we miss the daily maintenance, we're causing ourselves bigger problems down the line. So, I'll get off my soapbox for the moment. 3:54:24 PM CHAIR GIESSEL I've often said the private sector can't work as efficiently if the public sector is not doing its job, and that's really what you're saying. If we're not maintaining that road, it's costing the private sector, which ripples back to us. Thank you for your comments. 3:54:41 PM SENATOR KAWASAKI I'm actually looking at an old gas pipeline corridor study that was talked about under the old gas line inducement act in 2008 and I just noticed who had written it. It's actually from Frank Richards. We were talking about this under [Alaska Gasline Inducement Act] AGIA, and we talked about gas pipelines being different than TAPS because of buried construction. It would be more earth work, heavier pipe, greater use of modules, things like that. My question deals with the one Senator Myers just mentioned about the bad roads equaling slower gas line construction and then increased cost, because that's actually on the slide. But the question has to do with who pays for the maintenance on the road, and how is it paid for now, and then, I've got a question to follow up. 3:55:31 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON So, who pays now? It's a combination of general funds and federal funds, to maintain that road right now. And that's pretty much it. As the pipeline moves forward, we intend to have discussions with Glenfarne. We can only afford so much on maintenance. If you were to go up the Dalton Highway, as Senator Myers knows, our camps, they're not 24-hour camps. We have limited crews up there. We have a certain amount of equipment. And so, if there's expectation to ramp up by the state, then that's something we would need additional resource for, absolutely. 3:56:15 PM SENATOR KAWASAKI In the 1980's, [Federal Energy Regulatory Commission] FERC ruled that the pipeline traffic of ordinary highway use is not allowable as a financial responsibility, so the trucks that go up there for ordinary highway use of pipeline traffic, you can't penalize them. With that said, how is the state going to find a way to recoup the costs in order to help pay for the maintenance of the road and infrastructure now, and this is just the Dalton corridor section, the 415 miles? 3:56:53 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON That's a great question. When we were working through the Manh Choh ore haul a few years ago, that was similar. If industry comes forward with a legal truck, it's not oversize, overweight, we have federal requirements. We put federal dollars into these highways. They absolutely have the right to use that highway. We don't have that ability to, per se, charge them. So, there's always that restriction. Now, once you get into oversized, overweight vehicles, those are permitted, and so we do charge for the use of the highway for those vehicles. 3:57:29 PM SENATOR KAWASAKI  I'm trying to figure out how much money you anticipate you're going to need for this added pipeline construction. This legislative briefing was published in 2008 with the anticipation of six construction seasons needed before gasline construction began. I don't think we're there quite yet, but if Glenfarne wants to put pipe, start building pipe or putting pipe in the ground in December of next year, it sounds like we're six years behind schedule. And I'm just trying to figure out, not just the maintenance cost, but how are you upgrading to the point where Glenfarne feels comfortable moving trucks up and down the Dalton corridor. 3:58:18 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON The Dalton Highway right now accommodates an enormous amount of industrial traffic. It has its challenges. There's no doubt. And then we do our best to address those challenges as they occur. So, can the Dalton Highway accommodate pipeline construction? There'll be a lot of stress on the Dalton Highway, but it was built for pipeline construction originally. So, we recognize that as we go forward, we're going to have to get a better understanding from Glenfarne what their activities are. We'll be looking at it. When we went through the Manh Choh, we had our engineers looking, once we received the design vehicle and understood the loadings and the weights, we reviewed all our bridges. We had studies on the pavement. We really went through that whole gamut to understand where the risks were and whatnot. And that activity is going well. I have confidence in our teams as we go through there, that we're going to do a good job on that. 3:59:15 PM SENATOR KAWASAKI Just to follow up that this is the 2008 study that went out, there were 36 projects, including 24 highway projects, three airports, two bridges, seven facilities, scheduling between fiscal year 2009 and December 2014 when pipe was supposed to start to happen under the gas line inducement act (AGIA); the cost was going to be about a billion dollars in construction, averaging $167 million a year for six years. We did fund the first $100 million, and that's where some of those fixes were done in the 2010 timeframe that I remember on the slope. But you've spent $460 million, is what Miss Little said. And then adding another $450 [million] more. Do you have the money now to be able to do that? And do you have the wherewithal to even get it done before there's pipe in the ground by December of next year, according to Glenfarne. 4:00:14 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON What you'll see in our Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP), those are the funds. That's the resources we have to do these projects. And they're all in various stages of project delivery. There's one project, and I do have a slide on projects as we go through the presentation. But, for example, there's a project on the Dalton Highway that's called "zero to nine mile". It's a full realignment of the highway. It's finally getting close to where we've got all the permits and authorizations, the right-of-way secured. And when that's ready, we'll begin. All these projects won't be done before this aggressive schedule of the pipeline, but we will continue to work through them, as we work through this project. Yeah, the timeline. 4:01:01 PM CHAIR GIESSEL I'm looking at the map, and the first part of the Dalton up there is listed as green, as in: "good". Interesting. That's all. 4:01:16 PM SENATOR CLAMAN On the same theme, when you say we're getting by, we're maintaining with $20 million a year. My immediate question, when I listen to all these discussions and the increased cost described by Senator Myers, and the reality that if we have another construction project, we may be doubling or tripling the volume of vehicles going over, and all carrying heavy loads, which translates to more potholes and more damage, and then I hear you say, well, you know, if we pass this fiscal plan, there's going to be this $15 fee that we can then use for corridor maintenance. My reaction is that it sounds like you're saying we are already behind the curve on corridor maintenance. We need the money today if we're going to meaningfully have this road in condition to have a major construction project. And waiting to do that until we pass a revenue measure that may or may not make it through the legislature. What I'm hearing from the description and from particularly what Senator Myers describes about the damage to goods that are going down that very road that is designed for pipelines and oil construction, it still sounds like it's not in shape today, and it sounds like we've been underfunding the maintenance for some time. Am I missing something? 4:02:37 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON The 500 miles from Fairbanks to Prudhoe Bay: it's a challenging stretch to maintain. We're still upgrading stretches. There were still old pipeline alignments, and we're trying to get them up to standards. So, the material sources are a big challenge there. We're really excited about the public land order (PLO) 5150 revocation, because that opens up material sources for us. It's been difficult to work with Bureau of Land Management (BLM) on that front. The $20 million, we do our best. The reduction last year, the $5.5 million hurt, there's no doubt. We're looking everywhere we can so we can keep the money on the Dalton and then, when the discussion about the [leadership] restructure earlier, some of what we're doing is looking through our other positions and deleting PCNs so that we can have money to put towards those frontline services. Within our agency we're doing our best to accommodate the state's fiscal situation. If there were additional funds towards the Dalton, I think we all recognize those could be well utilized right now, for sure. 4:03:47 PM SENATOR CLAMAN It feels like we're underfunding it. 4:03:54 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Looking at the map again, most of the roads here are yellow. And I'm not just focusing on the Dalton. I believe it's the American Society of Civil Engineers that grades roads and states, and I believe we commonly get a D. 4:04:16 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON You're stretching my memory. I thought we got a C last year on pavement. We get B's on bridges. We get very well complimented on our bridges and our systematic way that we address bridges. I didn't think we got a D on pavement, but I would have to go back and look. 4:04:34 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Basically, what you're saying is, underfunding is the issue. 4:04:39 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON We meet all our federal performance metrics, and so when you look across the system, we're there or above what the federal government says, according to a performance metric. But when you get into the Dalton Highway, what they don't include in that is, no one has a national highway system route that's gravel. And so, that's not included. So, there's some nuances of Alaska that work into this. 4:05:08 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Thank you. I appreciate that. It's something that this legislature has to take into account as we consider this mega project. We're going to have to maintain some roads to do this. Is there anything else on this slide that you wanted to highlight? 4:05:28 PM MS. KEITH The one item to look at as a takeaway is this QR code that's on the slide. This gives you the opportunity to pull up this map in greater detail. You could navigate it. It is GIS based that would allow you to narrow in on some of these sections, for example, the green section of the Dalton being paved, and being able to look exactly where those sections are, and you can correlate that to, we can even overlay it with our proposed project construction plan, so we can see where we're addressing some of the poor areas where projects are coming up. Please look at that. That's helping to guide our decision making on our capital program. Certainly the 2008 study had a lot of great information in it, but now, 18 years later, so we can now put that into the dashboard, and along with any other developments since then for decision making right now. 4:06:40 PM MS. KEITH moved to slide 5, Capital Programming, Positioning DOT&PF's Capital Program to Support LNG Construction Logistics. The takeaway here is to be able to communicate a little bit about our resources, what federal funds we have available for capital projects. For the Department of Transportation (DOT), we have Federal Highways Administration funds as well as Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) funds. And together, while we do have other funding, those form the backbone of our highways and airport improvements that we can make. Last year, we did have a record-breaking year on a couple fronts. We were able to obligate $922 million of Federal Highways funds, and part of that includes what we received for additional obligation limitation through federal highways of $183 million. What that means is we're able to spend revenue that we have already attributed to Alaska, but because we had increased authority, we were able to spend those dollars and translate that into construction. $183 million was certainly a record year for us. That also enabled us to put out over $1 billion dollars of contract awards across our highways and airport projects. Having those issued last year carries forward into construction this year as well; to have those contractor payments out and to get these projects going as early as possible in this construction season. We have several tools at our disposal to help us with, to give us some flexibility with, programming our funds. One of these tools is called "advanced construction", and this is with Federal Highways funds only, but this allows us to front fund projects on future years' revenue and apportionments coming into the state. If we only receive $800 million, for example, from federal highways, we can obligate higher amounts than that. We could obligate one double that, one and a half million, we must pay that back, though in future years, which means in those future years, there's less new construction funding. Going back to flexibility, as conversations are held over the Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP) and the projects in there, that's a tool that allows us to move things in earlier as needed to accommodate the priorities across our transportation system. One thing with advanced construction, we must have that state match to go with it. Any increase in using that advanced construction then goes back to requiring match at that time. With ongoing conversations you've likely heard about our reduced state match available going into the construction season in fiscal year '26. We're balancing immediate project needs, project delivery schedules, what's available to go this summer with also utilizing the tools that we have, which means we can pay back this advanced construction this year without requiring state match. These are things that we'll be talking about in upcoming weeks as the STIP is out for review. Our aviation program received, in Federal Aviation Administration grants, approximately $340 million and those go into airfield projects, like terminals at airports, safety improvements, lighting upgrades and those things. And we have our Airport Improvement Program, which is available online as well, which highlights the projects that we're looking at in the upcoming years. 4:10:42 PM SENATOR WIELECHOWSKI Are there any bridges along the route that are considered structurally deficient that would need to be upgraded before the construction season began for the project. 4:10:59 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON We're constantly looking at our bridges to make sure we're keeping them in a state of good repair. For example, this summer, we recognize that a bridge along the Parks Highway was coming due and so we accelerated a project, and you're going to see a bridge replacement project this summer along there. And we do have a list of bridge projects in subsequent slides, so you can see the different ones that we're working on. 4:11:30 PM SENATOR WIELECHOWSKI Do you anticipate that all those bridges will be completed before this December, which is when Glenfarne is saying construction will begin? 4:11:44 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON We went through this on the Manh Choh again, where we had the haul trucks that met all state regulations for hauling. When we do have oversized, overweight vehicles, for specific work that's done, for each bridge, if we recognize that a bridge is starting to see some stress, we start monitoring programs. We can track things there. If we did get to a situation where we thought a bridge had a structural problem, the first step is to do what's called load posting, and start limiting the weight that can go across. We have measures on how we do that. It's procedural as we go through so we feel comfortable with the gas line and what our infrastructure can handle. And if something changes, we have provisions to handle that. 4:12:36 PM SENATOR WIELECHOWSKI Do you know if FERC has issued a notice to proceed for construction activities, or is the project currently authorized only for pre-construction work? 4:12:48 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON I'd have to defer to the staff at Alaska Gasline Development Corporation (AGDC) for that. 4:12:57 PM SENATOR DUNBAR I don't want to derail the conversation or jump too far ahead, but I guess I'm sort of curious, Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner. Some of what you're describing is more general success and challenges faced by the department. And I think the presentation today is pretty focused, because we're not the Transportation Committee, on the gas pipeline. On one of your later slides, you have a description of the Knik Arm Crossing. Are you asserting the Knik Arm Crossing is part of what we need to construct for the gas pipeline, or did that just happen to be in here, because this is a broader presentation? 4:13:44 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON Senator Dunbar, what slide are you on?  SENATOR DUNBAR Slide 10, but again, I don't want to jump ahead. COMMISSIONER ANDERSON There's a slide later where we talk a little bit more about opportunities that surround the gas line. There is a broader discussion on that slide as well. 4:14:03 PM SENATOR DUNBAR I think some of my constituents would not describe that bridge as an opportunity at this point. I'm sorry, Madam Chair, as we're going through these slides, in the interest of time, I'm hoping we can sort of focus on LNG, the LNG pipeline specifically. 4:14:26 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Thank you, Senator Dunbar, part of the focus on the gas pipeline is the cost to the state: what are we going have to pony up? Moving back to slide five, I'm looking at advanced construction balance, $576 million. And that's great, but that means there has to be a match of, are we talking $57.6 million there from the State of Alaska? And at this point we have a $70 million match we're trying to make. There are costs here we need to be aware of, that we need to make sure DOT is budgeted for, so that these kinds of things can be done, leveraging that federal money. 4:15:13 PM SENATOR KAWASAKI Since I'm not on the transportation committee and wasn't on Senate Finance Committee when they talked about this, I just need to hear that the $70 million or whatever the match is, is not a necessity? In an earlier iteration this year, coming into this, we kind of assumed that we might have to vote on the first fast track supplemental that we've done in a dozen years. But we're told now; I'm just reading the article from the [Anchorage Daily News] ADN, that that's not necessary. But I know that my contractors in Fairbanks are saying we absolutely want the guarantee that it's going to be done. And every pause and every wait until May is damaging to them. So, I'm trying to get it straight what needs to get done in order for those things to happen, for pipeline construction, for all of these bridges to be done - now. 4:16:09 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON We absolutely need the match. There's no question about that. The question has been about the timing of the need. When we were asked when does DOT need the match? We have match. There was $30 million that was still appropriated for this year. There was also carry-over match. We have carry-over match every year. We have enough match to get through July 1, when you look at it from a cash flow perspective. That was the question we were asked. And that was why you saw the supplemental issued, not a fast track, but a regular supplemental issued for that match. There's no doubt that the certainty, and we've heard a lot from the contractors, and 100%, I can understand their perspective. They want certainty and we like certainty in our program, too, and so, that matters. From that perspective, I can understand their desire for expediency from the numbers perspective. And what we were asked, we have enough match to get us through July 1 for an undisrupted project flow. 4:17:27 PM MS. KEITH moved to slide 6, Intermodal Connectors: Rail & Port. We have focused a lot on highways and airports, but of course, where freight is going to be coming into the state is going to be at its ports, and with heavy utilization of our railroad, with Department of Transportation, we do have, by statute, that authority and a requirement to coordinate across these modes of transportation: highways, rails, ports, marine systems, and so through that, we are in pretty close coordination on several fronts. The Port MacKenzie Rail Extension is one example where, working with the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, the Alaska Railroad Corporation and others, we can try to identify some other opportunities to get cargo into the state where otherwise there may be some constraints or restrictions. For example, utilizing only the railroad coming up from Seward where there may be some bottlenecks, and identifying other port opportunities where that pipe could come in opens the door to safer transportation as it goes forward into construction. DOT will be engaged in these conversations and trying to find, through our resources of funding that we've mentioned in our existing plans, the State long range transportation plan. We have a freight plan, which is updated regularly through stakeholder input. And we're developing a rail plan as well, updating our rail plan for the State of Alaska. So, through these measures, what we are looking to do is not necessarily just construct improvements for the gas line but ensure that the improvements that we're making also coordinate well and help set us up for investment in the state longer term. So being able to not only benefit just this one project but looking at other state investments in the future as well. 4:19:43 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Perhaps you can answer this question. I'm hearing that the Alaska railroad would need to have rail upgrades to transport these large segments of pipe; that what they have right now is not strong enough, durable enough to handle those heavy loads. Do you have any insight into that? 4:20:02 PM MS. KEITH The railroad, of course, is best to answer that, and we happen to have a member of the board here. I'll just say that our focus is on expediency and efficiency. It's not necessarily that those things would prohibit construction, but to be able to move forward at the pace that would be desirable, there certainly could be some infrastructure improvements and alternative transportation corridors and pathways to get material up north. CHAIR GIESSEL Thank you for that. We will be inviting the Alaska railroad to come to the table as well. You talked about coordination; I thought you might be able to speak to it. 4:20:50 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON moved to slide 7, Fairbanks Gateway to the North. This slide is dedicated to Fairbanks. There are some people from Fairbanks here. With the railroad terminus in Fairbanks, that is going to be a major logistical point for offloading pipe and moving it the 500 miles to Prudhoe Bay, unless somebody comes in from up north, but we're really thinking about that with the current, where we have projects right now, what that activity might look like. Of course, the Alaska railroad yard is a key place in that area where activities happen. We have active projects with the Johansen Expressway, the Steese Expressway right there that we fully expect could be a bottleneck. And then, as you go north, just to get out of Fairbanks there are some things, going back to the bridge question. There is a bridge that goes over the Chena Hot Springs Road when you exit there, that has been deficient. We've had to weight-restrict it for quite some time. Depending on what you're hauling up north, you may have to go around through the roundabouts and not use the bridge. We do have a project to upgrade that bridge. We would like to get that out as quickly as we could. It got hung up in some of the [Municipal Planning Organization] MPO discussions when we had with the Manh Cho. And then also, with the air quality concerns up there, there were some things we had to get through, but we're moving on that. That is the center of our Northern Region Maintenance and Operations Group, and so, there will be a big focus there for how we maintain things and move things. CHAIR GIESSEL I'm having trouble envisioning those long pieces of pipe navigating the roundabout to bypass the ridge. I'm not a truck driver, Senator Myers, but it seems like that'd be a big deal. Did you have a comment? 4:22:49 PM SENATOR MYERS When they put those roundabouts in, they were smart enough to include a bypass so you can take those 80 footers off and go up without having to go all the way around it. 4:23:07 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON moved to slide 8, Dalton Highway Strategic Backbone. We did do a slide on the Dalton Highway to give you that sense of the 414 total miles of Dalton Highway and the 250 of gravel. We do have pavement where we can make pavement work up there; some places we have pavement; it doesn't work so good up there. I'll be honest about that. The demand for heavy maintenance - this [PLO] 5150 revocation is a big deal. And the quicker that can happen, the sooner we can have access to those gravel resources, the better we can do our jobs. Otherwise, we can be hauling gravel for 50 or 60 miles, and you can only do so much when that's the case. So, this is just that summary of the Dalton [Highway] and you can see all the reds and greens and the leaders on here are our past and future projects, all the Dalton Highway capital projects. 4:23:59 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Commissioner, there's a section here where the, well, I call it the blob. The earth is moving toward the road. You had to re- align the road. Where is that section and how threatening is the blob's advancement to the new section. 4:24:22 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON I'm trying to remember the mile post. SENATOR MYERS 218. COMMISSIONER ANDERSON Thank you. That was something. It was several; we watched it come towards the road. And we had the university and everybody that had instrumentation, and we even have, you can go today, you can go online, and you can see what it looks like. The university has cameras and everything out there. It has gone over the old road now. We're monitoring the speeds and we'll see; it's a way away. We moved the road quite a bit. We basically moved the road right down to where the pipeline is. So, the next time the blob comes, it's not just going to be DOT, I think Alyeska is going to be pretty concerned too. But we watch those things. There's a lot of folks and there's been a lot of research on that, because it is kind of a unique phenomenon for the Arctic. It's kind of this big, moving rock and ice mass with trees on it and everything else that comes down. 4:25:20 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON moved to slide 9, Parks Highway Primary Route. Because the Parks Highway is [and] will be a primary corridor area from Nenana down south of the Chulitna, we did put a listing of the bridges here; the Chulitna River Bridge is one that we wanted to replace for some time. I think there's an opportunity here to work with industry, because there may be potential to use that for the pipeline. The Nenana River Bridge at Moody is another one where industry has indicated interest in using that for the pipeline. And for those of you that aren't aware the translatable pipeline (TAPS) is mounted on the Yukon River Bridge. The Nenana River Bridge at Rex is one that we'll be replacing this summer. And then we have the Chena Hot Springs Road Undercrossing on there as well. And then you can see that the grouping of projects that are currently in our STIP along the Parks Highway, they're there to address current needs. As we go forward, we always have the option to accelerate these projects, because they are in a design phase. We do have engineers working on them, and they're all scheduled logically. But if, for some reason, one section, we wanted to move quicker with another, we just add resources, and we work that. This is something we're working on. Other things to think about on the Parks Highway: shared material sources. Everyone's going to need gravel. This will have access to railroad logistical hubs. And that is something on the question on the railroad - there are discussions about sidings and where you can offload pipe and that whole piece. So, we're a part of that. There will be construction within the right-of-way. For those of you that have been through Denali Park and that narrow section, the pipeline will be installed adjacent to the road, it will be buried in that narrow section. So, there'll be a lot of shared work there. And then the oversized, overweight permitting on the Parks [Highway] will be essential. The seasonal road restrictions will be an issue. And so we'll be working with industry on how we're going to address that. When you get to those times when the roads are soft because we're coming off winter. All those things, we're trying to really put thought into. 4:27:37 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Commissioner, this, all the rehabilitation and reconstruction. Is that in your budget request now? 4:27:46 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON These are all in our Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP). That's a four-year plan, and so it wouldn't be in this year's budget, but they are programmed in our federal program. What will happen is the design, potentially the right- of-way and the utilities phases may be in the budget, because we're doing the preliminary work, and that is in the budget. But the actual construction would be whatever year it is in the Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP). 4:28:23 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON moved to slide 10, Mat Su Logistics Corridor, Building Alaska's Intermodal Future. On this slide, we've been doing a lot of work because we recognize that Port MacKenzie could have real value to a pipeline construction scenario. When you look at where the pipeline must go, having all that pipe go through Anchorage has its disadvantages. We've been looking hard at what it would take to get the Port MacKenzie rail extension going. We have engaged with a company called Macquarie [Capital] and [Global Rail Developer] Martinus: Macquarie is on the financial side and Martinus is on the rail building side, to get some preliminary work done to look at financial models, as well as reach out to industry. Because it's more than the gas line that could benefit from an industrial port concept of Point MacKenzie. They're doing that work now, we'll see what comes of that. The railroad extension is the embankment that was built quite some time ago with state funds. The state has invested several hundred million dollars already. The idea is: what's the best way to complete that? Also, you see the West Susitna access road. That's the road that goes out to the west from the Port MacKenzie rail extension. And the key piece there is you'll see where the AK LNG route is. It's that red line on the left coming down, and it is on the west side of the West Susitna River. Having road access there does have some very big benefits to pipeline construction. The state is actively working on that project, DOT is [working on it] for the first 20 miles that gets us across the West Susitna River. And then the next section is where the AIDEA project is picking up and going on, but this section would be a public road. We did have the discussion on the Knik Arm Crossing. That is something the Mat-Su [Borough] has been very vocal about, that continued push to understand that project. One thing we recognized over the past few years was that tunneling technology has changed significantly, and so we've been working on doing some technical engineering work on the feasibility of a tunnel under Knik Arm and that work will become public very soon. That's been something. We understand with Knik Arm Crossing there was a lot of controversy surrounding Government Hill, the belugas. Some of these things we feel could be mitigated by a tunnel, if you didn't have to go through Government Hill and you went under Knik Arm, so we've got that work. We've been reaching out to companies like the boring company, and they've shown some interest, but it's real preliminary discussions. But those types of things, as we look across what's possible over there, get interesting. The other piece is this idea of sustainable aviation fuel development. If you look at the Anchorage International Airport, we're using over 900 million gallons of Jet A [fuel] in those 747s and 777s every year. Industry came forward and said, sustainable aviation fuel for the benefits of reduced carbon is of very much interest to us. And we got letters of interest for about 300 million gallons annually. Deputy Commissioner Keith has been doing a lot of feasibility work about this. This fuel is created from different feed stocks. It can be woody biomass. It can be fish waste, different things. We've been in the background, doing a lot of technical work on that front as well. 4:32:23 PM SENATOR DUNBAR Your earlier slide stressed the importance of the Dalton [Highway], and I had a realization. Here you have construction happening by West [Susitna], but a lot of the construction will start at the North Slope and move down, right? I imagine there will be construction from the other direction as well, but materials must go all the way to the top or near, and they'll sort of start to come down. And so, it enters the state. My question is about the port of entry. If it's going on the railroad, does it start in - here you have us extending the railroad to Point MacKenzie. But let's assume that doesn't happen or Point McKenzie is unable to take these things on time. Does it come in through the port of Alaska at Anchorage, or does it come in through Seward? I have a follow up to that, Madam Chair. 4:33:17 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON I couldn't speak definitively on that, of where Glenfarne, where the logistical plans would bring the pipe in. Of course, Seward has a freight dock that could be a port of entry. We don't believe Whittier [is feasible]. Whittier is deep water, but we don't believe they have the space there. And then the Port of Alaska, of course, is a primary point of entry for Alaska. 4:33:43 PM SENATOR DUNBAR I appreciate that the Port of Alaska is here, but it's not listed as one of your bullet points. Port of Alaska has critical repair and maintenance needs. Could the repair of the Port of Alaska be necessary if we want the Alaska, the AK LNG project to go forward, or could it be part of, could we see the [Port of Alaska Modernization Program] PAMP as some call it, as part also of our infrastructure investment to accelerate the Alaska Natural Gas Pipeline? 4:34:17 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON That's a good point. Port of Alaska should be here as a key strategic asset. There's no doubt. That's where 60% of our jet fuel for Anchorage International Airport comes in through the Port of Alaska. There are critical needs there to be accommodated. We have been talking to the Port of Alaska as well. I should add that to this slide, absolutely. 4:34:40 PM SENATOR DUNBAR I appreciate that, Commissioner, and I would be interested in a future presentation about what, if any, changes might be needed at the Port of Alaska to accommodate a project of this scale. Or is it simply they can continue with their current modernization project, but we at the state, need to continue to inject capital into that project, as we have in the past, because it is such a crucial piece of our infrastructure. 4:35:12 PM SENATOR RAUSCHER You mentioned earlier the 20 miles out the West [Susitna] to the bridge. So, my understanding is it's underway, and is there a completion date? 4:35:27 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON We've been working very hard on the environmental assessment, the permitting. We have a partnership with the Knik tribe, who support the project to move this thing through all the steps as we go. We're in that full project development stage on that right now. We would love to be in construction for the first phase, just to get a pioneer road in this fall. We're still working towards that. As we work out towards the bigger bridge, right now we're projecting six bridges along this route. Several of them are more like single span bridges. But the West Susitna is about 2000 feet in length, and that would be more in 2027, 2028 construction agreement. 4:36:23 PM SENATOR MYERS I'll take a little heat off the Point [MacKenzie] versus [Port of Alaska] Anchorage debate. On your larger slide, you pointed out Valdez and, probably not as critical this time around as compared to TAPS, but still a major port, still bringing a lot of freight that's either too large or too dangerous to bring through Anchorage. I'm curious how that fits into your thinking. 4:37:00 PM fix COMMISSIONER ANDERSON Valdez absolutely is important. We've done a lot of work on the Richardson [Highway] south of Glennallen, that stretch through from Glennallen north to Delta Junction. We have some pretty big projects scheduled, some this summer. And then we've upgraded the Richardson [Highway] between Delta Junction and Fairbanks with the passing lanes and whatnot. We're feeling good about that piece of it. There are still some bridges there, too, that we've got to address that are in our STIP. We've got to make sure that's covered. We do recognize there are times when some of these big loads that are coming up can't get across the Chulitna Bridge, and so we must go on the Glenn [Highway] and up the Richardson [Highway] and over to Fairbanks, because of the restrictions for certain large loads on that bridge as well. We must care for that, absolutely. 4:37:52 PM MS. KEITH moved to slide 11, Kenai Spur Reroute Readiness Pathway One key project that will be critical for the natural gas liquefaction facility is in Nikiski with the Kenai Spur Highway reroute. This has been in discussion for several years. This is a project that's being led by AGDC. The design of this reroute, the slide shows briefly where this reroute would go. It would be approximately 3.9 miles. It would be designed up to modern standards for the two-lane highway, allowing for traveling of both the public and any heavy trucks. This allows the contiguous footprint of the liquefaction facility, so that the public during construction or other times do not have to go through or near that construction. This is an important safety improvement that we're working on. The estimated cost is $30 to $40 million. 4:39:04 PM MS. KEITH moved to slide 12, Aviation Infrastructure I touched briefly on aviation earlier, but what I didn't comment on was where those airports are and how critical they will be for construction of the gas line. There are several airports along the haul road that are owned and maintained by DOT, not all of them. What we've been doing is looking at these airports for any upgrades they may need to the runway surfacing and anything with their lighting that could be done so that as we have increased amount of construction staff and drivers along the way that we have the airports in good shape, whether it's for medevacs or for bringing in supplies, for man camps and other things. The airports that we would expect to have significantly increased use would be up in Deadhorse with a 6500-foot runway. It allows for the larger aircraft needed to bring in major supplies. And further south, there at the Anchorage International Airport and Fairbanks International Airports, both, with the increased amount of activity in Alaska, would naturally see increased use. Further south, we have Kenai Airport, which will also have additional activity. In our airport improvement program, we're taking these into consideration so that we can plan for that increased use and shore up, make the resiliency of the airports as solid as we can. In our rural airports off the road system, we are challenged with weather reporting. That is a challenge that all our airports face and we're paying attention to these things. Our weather reporting stations are not within the department's oversight, but we do collaborate with National Weather Service and FAA on these reporting stations to try to support the improved operation, to help them be as reliable as possible. 4:41:14 PM CHAIR GIESSEL A question on the haul road airports: these are all short runway gravel surface. Is that true? MS. KEITH Correct. 4:41:21 PM CHAIR GIESSEL But they could accommodate a Lear[jet], for example, a medevacking aircraft. 4:41:30 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON Typically, you must have special equipment to land a jet on gravel. Typically, you'll see the [Beechcraft] King Airs that are doing the medevacs up there. A lot of these airports were built for the Trans Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS), and have been upgraded over time, so they're definitely capable of the large, heavy haul aircraft,[Lockheed Martin] Hercules, C-130s. 4:42:09 PM CHAIR GIESSEL When we have a mega project, injuries happen. I was an RN during TAPS. We had a lot of clients, a lot of patients in the hospital. 4:42:20 PM MS. KEITH moved to slide 13, Readiness Actions Underway. There are other things besides infrastructure improvements we need to do. Emergency response management is a very important one. A tool that we have is our Programmatic Agreement that we've been in discussion over with Glenfarne to pre-negotiate terms - how we're going to work together to ensure the safety of those corridors. Emergency response is a good example of that. Who's responsible for what? How often are we going to have medevac sites available? And how are we going to work through permitting? We can have some of the agreements predetermined through one common operating agreement. We can modify that as we move forward and we learn more specifics about the constructability plan for the gas line. We have mentioned Alaska 511 where we have a freight mode which helps drivers be able to see any things of concern along the route, and can help with reroutes, areas where there are pull outs or bypasses. We have bridge heights included there as well to help reduce the risk of bridge strikes, which has been a known issue in the state as well. 4:43:45 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON moved to slide 14, Highway Permitting and Compliance. Another piece of this, the highway permitting compliance, is a big piece of this. We have a strong team that works on this right now. And technology is our friend for this. We're really hoping that with more mobile monitoring stations we can allow trucks to move through without having to do quite so many checks. Some of the things we look at, if you're a truck driver and you have a good record, there are advantages to that in terms of how you're inspected, at what frequency and whatnot. There are some good strategies to make sure that, on the trucking side, recognizing additional activity, limited resources, but we're still caring for the laws and regulations that we abide by. 4:44:35 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON moved to slide 15, Workforce Readiness Challenges. Workforce is high on our list. There are a lot of good concerns about when these pipeline jobs come in, what happens to all of our folks that are maintaining our highways, airports, across the board. We're doing a lot with workforce right now in terms of training opportunities - we have scholarship programs to get young people in to get [Commercial Driver's Licenses] CDLs and then work for the state. We're doing more with contracting. You'll see even with our snow removal now, when we get events, you'll see contractors out doing snow removal. We're trying to really make sure that we can scale up as we need to. And then if we do get into a situation where we're going to be struggling to maintain our workforce that we have that knowledge and that ability to quickly do some things like contracting or whatnot. There's been other discussions too, about incentives and those types of things, but that's early for us. We'll be continuing to work through that to make sure that we can maintain our roads and highways and airports. 4:45:52 PM SENATOR RAUSCHER When you talk about bridges being rebuilt along the way on the Parks Highway, I was just wondering - if it went by rail, you wouldn't have to worry about any kind of traffic all the way to Fairbanks. 4:46:12 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON That's a good point. We're big advocates for the rail. It takes a lot of pressure off our highway system. Those stretches of the Parks Highway, there is still going to be active construction, and so there will be pipe unloaded and then moved on the highway to its construction location. So, there will still be a fair amount of activity. 4:46:33 PM SENATOR RAUSCHER But it would limit it greatly and take the strain off, wouldn't it. 4:46:39 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON Absolutely. 4:46:43 PM SENATOR DUNBAR The chair pointed this out earlier: her experience while TAPS was being built. We've gone through this before, something like this. Granted, we're a very different state, but what did the state do while TAPS was being built with [regard to] those kinds of jobs. It must have had a similar pressure on our state employees that were maintaining our roads and highways and maintainers. What did the state do? Do we know? What did they do back then, tackle this challenge? 4:47:17 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON That's a good question, and maybe that's something we could do a little more work on. I have a lot of anecdotal stories from people that stuck around and people that didn't. In some respects, it was different times. I think the expectation right now for road maintenance, when there are snow storms and things, is a lot higher than it used to be. There's so much information available. It's a good question. It's something we could do a little more work on, for sure. 4:47:54 PM CHAIR GIESSEL I share that concern, Senator Dunbar. I think the wages that will be offered on the pipeline work will be far higher than what the state is offering. That will be a challenge: keeping our workforce in place. 4:48:11 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON moved to slide 16, Next Steps & Legislative Support Needed. This is just a quick slide: the importance of our capital budget; the importance of our operating budget. We're working through the [Alaska Administrative Order 360] AO 360 regulatory reform. That's going to be important. As a pipeline comes to fruition, our ability to be responsive and to have our infrastructure in good shape as we start is important. We're proud of our infrastructure in Alaska. There are a lot of talented engineers across the state, working for the state and for contractors. They've, we've built a pretty robust system here. Recognizing there will be some stress there, but we're up for the challenge. So, thank you. 4:48:56 PM SENATOR MYERS I think one thing that should be on here that isn't is the [Statewide Transportation and Infrastructure Plan] STIP itself. One of the things that we've highlighted in this presentation here is the role that the STIP plays in our infrastructure, and sometimes the role the STIP doesn't play, but should. I hammered on this a little bit when we were talking about the Dalton Highway. We have all these projects set up for the Dalton [Highway], but not necessarily the maintenance money to maintain what we've already got or to maintain after those projects have gone through. And it's been, call this my own opinion here, I think that in some ways, we're better off on the Dalton Highway taking some of the money out of some of those projects and putting it into the maintenance. Senator Kawasaki brought up the 2008 study on some of the things that need [to be] done, that need [to be] built to support a gas line or something similar, and that have not gotten done already. And this isn't a money issue. We're talking 2008 to 2014 back when, well, we were holding in the dough in a lot of ways. So, this tells me it's a programmatic problem. And so, I get concerned, nothing against Commissioner Anderson or anything you've done since in your time there, but I get concerned that we have fallen into a pattern in this state of, when we use our STIP or other programmatic things like [the STIP], we have taken away the focus on - what does our construction do to benefit our economy in the long run, and focused much more on - how do we maintain jobs in the construction industry for a year or two. And now we're seeing the end results of that. We knew, now I understand the pipeline route has changed somewhat, because until 2013, 2014, when we made the decision that it was going to go to Nikiski. That may have changed some things, but we knew in 2008 that we needed to get some of this stuff done, and we did not do it, and our STIP did not reflect that. So, it's a large-scale concern that I've had for a while. And I think it's time for us, within the legislature and within the executive branch, both to recognize that it's not just about - let's maintain our construction jobs for a summer too. It's about what's going to benefit us 10 or 20 years down the line. And I'm worried that we're not doing that. 4:51:29 PM CHAIR GIESSEL So, Commissioner, we've understood that Glenfarne is counting on, in a way, or it's an option that the Department of Energy is going to fund a major portion of this work. Has DOT put together a budget for the next five years during which this construction will take place, as far as your needs will be financially. 4:52:02 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON I think what you'll see in our upcoming STIP, which is a four- year plan, will be how we're planning with the capital resources that we have available for that next four years. And that will include a focus on AK LNG, and what you're going to see is very similar to what you saw today in terms of the projects and what's not. When it comes to maintenance, I think about what the governor had with the pipeline corridor maintenance fund. That's a nice addition that helps us in a lot of areas for the maintenance piece of it, and so that gets at our operating costs. We are a frontline, can-do operation. And we're focused on the here and now and recognizing some of our experiences with some of the other industrial activities that have gone on. Have we put together a five-year plan for the entirety? I think you're going to see DOT come out with more once we get information from Glenfarne about the types of trucks, the weights, those activities along our highway, then we can assess more whether there are any weaknesses in our infrastructure that we need to address, or those types of things. 4:53:20 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Basically, you're on hold until the plan is rolled out to see what you'll be needing to do in terms of, because it seems to me, you're going to be asking for a pretty large budget. There's a lot of work here that you've described. 4:53:36 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON The things that you're seeing right now, we will be addressing in our STIP. So, that will be there. As we get more information on the logistical plans of Glenfarne, we'll be taking hard looks at those, absolutely. 4:53:53 PM SENATOR KAWASAKI I was looking at page eight, maybe to answer some of the questions. It talks about the investment corridor, resilience, the planned amount between 2026 and 2031, at about half billion, $450 - $500 million? I'm trying to figure out what corridor resilience means. Is that just to get to a standard that would be anticipated for pipeline construction or to maintain. 4:54:27 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON The numbers you see there, the plan is, that's what's in our STIP. It's based on where we know the road needs work. It needs upgrades. It could be because maybe the curves don't meet standards. It could be because we have a bridge that we recognize is coming due, it's lots of different reasons there. What you would see in the next, from 2026 to 2031, right now, is planned. And estimated is $454 million invested into reconstruction projects. 4:55:04 PM SENATOR KAWASAKI Taking back this 2008 briefing entitled "Infrastructure Improvements Needed to Support Gas Pipeline Construction," and then seeing where we're at today, I'm just trying to figure out how the timelines will sync. I think we're all super excited about hearing Glenfarne ready to put pipe into the ground in December of next year. And I'm just, I'm not convinced, hearing the report today that the roads will even be in a condition for that to happen. And so, I'm trying to get you to make a pitch for: Yeah, we'll be done. We'll be ready to go, if necessary, on day one in December of 2026. 4:55:53 PM COMMISSIONER ANDERSON One thing that might be helpful is we could go through that 2008 list, and we could identify the projects that were completed, and then any that may not have been. Because I'm familiar with the list. I don't have it in the top of my head, but I thought the last time I looked at it, we had done a significant amount of work off that list. One thing with DOT that I love about working and being in this role, and why I took this role, you just have a group of phenomenal people. I'm going to use Typhoon Halong and the West Coast storm as an example: the devastation out there and what happened and what occurred, and the way we were able to resource that - we had folks from Nome, Fairbanks, Juneau, southeast Alaska, Anchorage, you know, all of those. Deputy Commissioner Keith is leading that effort. We're out there actively rebuilding boardwalks and the roads, and we're delving into, we delved into housing and school repairs. We are a contracting agency. We get out on a response. We have contractors. Contractors are our partners, and we're working through these things. I think you're going to get that same response on the gas line. Everybody's in this together and with our infrastructure, when we start seeing weakness, we have ways we work through that. I'm confident we're ready for the gas line. I think you're going to see us really putting our heads to it, once we get more details here and we're going to be upfront and transparent about what's happening out there with everybody. So, I'm feeling good about it. I think we're going to, as we learn more, and recognizing the type of event this is, kind of going back to the beginning, where we had the gold rush, World War II, TAPS. I believe this is going to be an event like that. And we did those. And so, I'm excited about what's coming up in the future for transportation. 4:57:49 PM CHAIR GIESSEL Commissioner Anderson, Deputy Commissioner Keith, thank you very much. Very helpful presentation. I think the committee learned a lot and enjoyed the presentation. So, thank you for being here. 4:58:04 PM CHAIR GIESSEL announced that she was setting aside the hearing scheduled for SB 275 for a future meeting. 4:58:36 PM There being no further business to come before the committee, Chair Giessel adjourned the Senate Resources Standing Committee meeting at 4:58 p.m.