The Environmental Challenges Facing TAPS

• Main Author: Cardin, A. V.
• Format: Text
• Language: unknown
• Published: Scholars' Mine 1971
• Subjects: Geology; Geophysics and Seismology; Mining Engineering; Petroleum Engineering; north slope; Prudhoe Bay; Alaska
• Online Access: https://scholarsmine.mst.edu/umr-journal/vol2/iss1/12; https://scholarsmine.mst.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1020&context=umr-journal

Before the potential benefits of the recent oil discoveries on the North Slope of Alaska can be realized, the oil must be transported to refining and marketing areas. The Alyeska Pipeline Service Company has the responsibility for the first step in this transportation—to design and construct the Trans Alaska Pipeline System. We will pipe the oil from the discovery areas near Prudhoe Bay to an ice-free, deep-sea tanker loading terminal at Valdez of the South Coast of Alaska. From Valdez the oil will be transported to the West Coast by tankers. This is the most feasible system of a number considered. The basic facilities of the system consist of a pipeline, the pump stations, a tanker loading terminal, and a communications system to provide the necessary means of operating control. To make possible the construction of these facilities, a haul road must be constructed connecting the present Alaska road system to the Prudhoe area—a distance of some 400 miles.