According to a press release (.pdf) from the State of Alaska, the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act (AGIA) coordinator has submitted the latest gas pipeline progress report to the Alaska Legislature.

The report (.pdf) is current through April and details regulatory inducements and other actions made over the previous six months concerning the Alaska Pipeline Project (the official name for the AGIA line). The release quotes AGIA Coordinator Mark Myers, who explains,  “As the project advanced to Open Season the state needed to ensure we followed through on providing our inducements to the project as well as ensuring the commitments made by the Licensee were intact. Those details are documented in this report.”

The release notes the state reached three milestones: It "promulgated regulations relating to gas shipping commitments and to qualification for the AGIA royalty and tax inducements." It "obtained from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), a waiver from certain capacity release rules as they relate to the state’s royalty gas." And it "continued efforts to implement its strategic workforce development and training plan."

Readers may be forgiven for thinking that first item is a bit euphemistic. According to the report, it means (among other things) that the new, proposed regulations set a method for valuing the state's royalty share of natural gas, and set a methodology for determining what constitutes "AGIA gas" so that it can be kept separate for tax and royalty purposes. The regulations also address situations in which the state may choose taking physical product (gas) instead of cash as a royalty payment, and increase the time that producers would be notified in the event of that choice. The report notes, "The increased notice periods and capacity waiver granted by the FERC are expected to provide considerable value to potential shippers."

Also in the report: The state has updated AGIA's website to reflect a switch in focus from the licensing process to the development process. And the Alaska Pipeline Project now has its own project-specific website, complete with open-season filings and fact sheets. Petroleum nerds, rejoice!