Glenfarne's approach to financing Alaska LNG and the associated pipeline as two separate subprojects will give the US LNG developer an advantage where the previous iteration failed, executive vice president Austin Prestidge said on a conference panel last week.
The company plans to develop Alaska LNG, estimated to cost $44bn, in two phases with separate final investment decisions (FIDs). The first includes a natural gas treatment plant in Alaska's North Slope and a 765-mile pipeline south to the Anchorage area, which is facing a looming gas supply shortage. The second phase would add compression equipment, a 42-mile connector pipeline to Nikiski and the 20mn t/yr (2.67bn ft³/d) liquefaction terminal.
Each of those phases is independently financially viable and reduces the risk for creditors and offtakers, Prestidge said on a panel at the Energy Projects Conference and Expo in Houston, Texas, on 11 June.
The first phase would deliver gas into the domestic market in Anchorage, Alaska's most populous region, where declining production in the nearby Cook Inlet threatens a gas supply shortfall as early as 2027.
The proposed 3.5bn ft³/d pipeline, which Glenfarne expects to reach FID by the end of the year, would be the only conduit connecting Alaska's vast North Slope gas production to the southern part of the state. Most of the North Slope's gas volume is reinjected into oil reservoirs to help maintain crude production rates.
The pipeline would transport enough volume to satisfy domestic needs as well as feedgas for the LNG terminal.
"Whether you ever build the LNG export facility or not, that pipeline can get financed and be commercialized," Prestidge said.
ExxonMobil, BP and ConocoPhillips, the developers of the previous iteration of Alaska LNG, withdrew from the project in 2016 because of cost concerns.
It was difficult for that version "as a megaproject needing one big FID", with a high amount of risk for prospective offtakers in Asia, Prestidge said.
Glenfarne has not said when it expects to reach an investment decision on the liquefaction terminal, which has already obtained siting and construction authorization from the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission as well as export authorizations from the US Department of Energy.
The LNG developer announced in early June that it had received more than $115bn worth of bids from more than 50 companies. President Donald Trump has been pressuring allies in Asia to make investments in Alaska LNG in exchange for a deal on tariffs.
Taiwanese state-owned importer CPC signed a preliminary agreement in March to join Alaska LNG. The Philippines and Thailand have also expressed interest in buying volume from the project
Glenfarne has a 75pc stake in Alaska LNG, with the remaining 25pc held by state-owned Alaska Gasline Development.
