With new wind in its sails, what’s ahead for Alaska LNG? What does it mean for Mat-Su?

Following last week’s high-profile Alaska Sustainability Energy Conference in Anchorage, there seems to be new wind in the sails for the long-planned Alaska LNG Project.

This is the $40 billion-plus plan to build an 800-mile, 42-inch natural gas pipeline from the North Slope to Southcentral Alaska in its first phase and a large liquefied natural gas, or LNG, plant at Nikiski, near Kenai, in its second phase.

A substantial part of the needed gas pipeline will be built through the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, which will require a large number of construction workers as well as support from industrial suppliers including firms in the Mat-Su if the project is built.

It would also bring industrial property tax base to the borough and possibly lower natural gas prices.

Glenfarne Group, a private energy company now leading the big project, is now optimistic the project will finally get underway after decades of efforts, the company’s CEO told the energy conference. Brendan Duval, the CEO, said he plans to have revised cost estimates and investors for the pipeline part of the project by the end of this year.

That could allow construction to be underway next year the first gas delivered to Fairbanks and to Southcentral Alaska in 2028. Duval admitted the schedule is ambitious but that it is doable.

If North Slope gas does come to Mat-Su and Southcentral in 2028 it will be just in time for Matanuska Electric Association, or MEA, which faces the end of its contract to buy Cook Inlet gas from Hilcorp Energy in 2028. MEA buys about 6 billion cubic feet per year from Hilcorp.

However, gas production in the Cook Inlet producing fields will be winding down in 2027, according to state geologists. Unless the new North Slope gas is available MEA will have to buy imported LNG from the Lower 48 along with other utilities in the region including Chugach Electric Association and Enstar Natural Gas Co.

Duval said he believed Alaska LNG can be economic and that liquefied gas can be delivered to customers in Asia at 20% to 30% less cost than from competing suppliers. If built, Alaska LNG would tap 35 tcf of stranded North Slope gas and export up to 20 million tons of LNG at full development. Alaska’s state Alaska Gasline Development Corp., or AGDC, is a partner.

The project has been around for years and was previously advanced by a consortium of North Slope producers led by ExxonMobil Corp. and the state to a pre-feasibility level in 2016. AGDC has since then secured federal permits and authorizations for the project.

Glenfarne was brought into the project earlier this year and will apply its experience in project development financing to the project, which has now been broken down into three phases, Duval said. If the Final Investment Decision, or FID, comes at the end of 2025, as is planned, it would allow procurement of pipe and other equipment to be underway in 2026 and construction underway in 2027.

The FID for the pipeline will be an important “de-risking” signal to other invertors being courted for the large Liquefied Natural Gas plant needed for export, Duval said.

Construction of the 800-mile pipeline will be far easier and less risky than for the Trans Alaska oil pipeline in the 1970s, which was also 800 miles of pipe built along part of the same route as planned for the gas pipeline. Soil conditions are now well understood, the pipeline right-of-way and permits are secured and a number of Alaska contractors with Arctic experience are now available, all conditions that are different than for the oil pipeline, which experienced cost overruns.

Duval also cited key differences from recent oil pipelines built in western Canada where there were cost overruns. Problems with permitting and government agencies complicated construction and scheduling on those projects. In Alaska federal, state and local governments are unified in support, Duval said.

Glenfarne is bullish that the pipeline can be financed and built economically based on a rule-of-thumb of $150,000-per-inch mile for Lower 48 pipeline construction, and a premium added for Alaska to bring costs to $350,000 per-inch mile. That works out to $11.76 billion for 800 miles of 42-inch pipe.

The big advantage for Alaska, however, is the shorter shipping distances, and lower costs, for getting LNG to Asia markets, which will take one third of the time needed from the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, for example. “There are now waiting times of up to 10 days on either side of the Panama Canal,” which has become a choke point for LNG deliveries, he said.

Once the pipeline is underway engineering and financing for the LNG plant will get underway in phases for each of the three trains, Duval said. The target is to have LNG exports begin in 2031, he said.

Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who shared the podium with Duval at the conference, said securing a dependable energy supply for Army and Air Force installations in the Interior as well in Southcentral Alaska is now a major driving force in the Trump administration’s support for the project.

Dunleavy also said the timing is good for providing a trained workforce for the pipeline construction. Construction will be winding down on major new oil projects being built on the North Slope in the next two to three years, which will make several thousand workers experienced in Arctic conditions available.