More than 100 people rallied in support of the Alaska LNG Project on Tuesday in Kenai. The event came as state senators 600 miles away considered a high-stakes tax cut for the project the developer says is crucial to making it economical.
It was a sunny day at Davis Block and Concrete, where a group chanted, “Build the Line!” while holding matching signs or wearing tees and hats. In many ways, the event was typical of a summer festival. There’s face painting for the kids, free hot dogs and ice cream, and a raffle. But it isn’t the summer sun that’s brought them together. It’s a natural gas pipeline – “the line."
The rally was organized by Davis Block and Concrete, project developer Glenfarne and the Alaska Support Industry Alliance.
If built, the Alaska LNG Project would move North Slope natural gas through an 800-mile pipeline to Southcentral to be liquefied and shipped overseas. Supporters say it would tap into a stranded natural resource, strengthen national energy security and offer relief to Alaskans on the cusp of an energy crisis. But the project’s lofty price tag – $46 billion at last count – has long stood in the way.
Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor Peter Micciche said the project would have an outsized impact on the Kenai Peninsula. He ran the now-shuttered ConocoPhillips LNG export facility for decades and said the gasline is an opportunity to “make Nikiski noisy again.”
“There is not a community that benefits more – I'm sure you know about the economics of this project – than the Kenai Peninsula Borough and our local communities,” he said. “There's not one that even has the potential to be close.”
Micciche was one of a handful of dignitaries that lauded the pipeline’s potential at the rally.
Congressman Nick Begich III reiterated federal support for the project, which he said aligns with President Donald Trump’s priorities of bolstering American manufacturing and establishing “energy dominance.”
“Alaska is a resource state, whether that's oil and gas, or mining, timber, fishing, or tourism,” he said. “We live and die based on our ability to access and add value to the resources that we're blessed with in Alaska, and for generations we've known about the hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of natural gas that are currently stranded on Alaska's North Slope. This is the best opportunity that we have had in our lifetimes to see that gas brought to market.”
Also in attendance was Doug Fletcher. He’s the vice president of pipeline construction for Glenfarne, the private company that took the project over from the state last year. Fletcher’s resume includes helping construct the 1,100-mile Trans-Anatolian gas pipeline in Turkey. He said working in Alaska comes with unique geographic challenges.
“I like to tell people that a pipeline is just like an assembly line, except the assembly line moves down the product instead of the product moving down the assembly line,” he said. “We have four main line contractors working on it, and that way we can get finished in time.”
Fletcher told attendees he and his wife moved to Alaska from the Lower 48 about three months ago.
“We’re going to stay here until we get this pipeline built,” he said.
The construction element is of special interest to John Scoresby. He sat near the stage at a table laden with “Build the Line”-branded stickers, buttons and cookies. Scoresby works for Republic Services, a waste disposal company, and said the gasline would benefit Alaska and his company.
“We recycle used oil, and we sell oil, and we dispose of hazardous waste, which would be generated by all the companies that are doing the construction,” he said. “So it's just a support piece that a lot of people don't think about. But, you know, it's an important piece of doing work in Alaska.”
The gasline’s fate is still up in the air. Glenfarne has netted multiple non-binding agreements from potential LNG buyers, but the company still hasn’t fully committed to developing the project. The company has spent months lobbying state lawmakers for a tax break to make the project more economical.
Outgoing Gov. Mike Dunleavy is a major project supporter, and called lawmakers into a special session specifically to take up a tax break bill. The state House passed a bill last week that would replace Alaska’s existing property tax structure with a tax on the volume of natural gas moving through the pipeline. Glenfarne wouldn’t pay any taxes during the project’s first five years. The bill also includes $40 million to $80 million for payments to communities impacted by pipeline construction efforts, including the Kenai Peninsula.
That bill is now before state senators, who have long been more skeptical about giving Glenfarne such a big break. The House and Senate must pass the same version of the bill before it can head to Dunleavy’s desk. And lawmakers are running out of time before the end of the special session on Friday.
Soldotna Republican Rep. Justin Ruffridge voted in favor of the bill when it was still in the House. At the rally, he said the Kenai Peninsula ends up doing “quite well” in the legislation. He thinks lawmakers found a good middle ground between flooding boroughs with cash and giving Glenfarne a total abatement. The House bill would result in around 80% less revenue for the state than it would receive under Alaska’s existing tax structure.
“What is the benefit of low-cost energy?” he said. “What is the benefit of a job? What is the benefit of all of the businesses that will be here as a result of having a pipeline to North Kenai, and I think that you have to blend all of those things, and you have to do so in the case where you do need revenue to operate a borough, but you also don't need so much revenue that you're going to just be storing it in our general fund, where it doesn't go to any good use.”
Ruffridge said the Kenai Peninsula would uniquely benefit from the pipeline if the export facility is built in Nikiski through residual boosts to the economy.
Florence Hamman agreed that’d be a major perk. She sat in the shade, wearing a “Build the Line” baseball cap. She’s lived in North Kenai for decades and said the Alaska LNG Project is a family matter.
“My son works at the Unocal office keeping it in maintenance right now … and it's just so ironic how my son works there trying to keep it all and going and in business, and then here I am learning about all this, this line, and it could end right there where he's at,” she said. And then my daughter's fiance works up there at the Slope.”
As attendees head home, gusty winds blow “Build the Line” signs and stickers around the parking lot. From a booth run by event sponsor KSRM, a familiar tune with unfamiliar lyrics fills the air – a version of Johnny Cash’s “Walk the Line,” reworked as “Build the Line.”
