At a meeting last week in Inuvik, a community in Canada's Northwest Territories, an Imperial Oil spokesperson said it will be three years before the company makes a decision on the Mackenzie natural gas pipeline project, which at times has been in competition with Alaska's proposed gas pipeline.

Canada's National Energy Board (NEB) said Imperial must decide if it will go ahead with the project by the end of 2013. But now, another spokesperson, Pius Rolheiser, says the company intends to meet the 2013, but that it is going to be difficult.

"We need to do field work and other permitting work to secure the literally thousands of permits that we need to have in hand. We indicated to the NEB that completing all that work by the end of 2013 would be very challenging," he said.

Imperial had asked for a three-year extension to the 2013 deadline, but that request was declined.

If Imperial doesn't meet the deadline, the NEB says part of the review process will have to be redone.

In March 2011, the NEB approved the $16.2 billion natural gas pipeline that will run from the Beaufort Sea, through the Northwest Territories, to a hub in northern Alberta.