Summary: The Department of Energy (DOE) asserts that Congress will have to authorize the leasing of the coastal plain of Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge--an area of high oil and gas potential--by 1997 to keep the Trans-Alaska Pipeline operating. DOE concludes that because of the projected rate of decline in oil production from Alaska's North Slope, the pipeline will likely be forced to shut down by the year 2009. The possible shutdown of the pipeline could be a consideration in reaching a policy decision on whether to open the refuge to oil and gas development or whether to designate the coastal plain as wilderness, thereby precluding future development. In assessing DOE's conclusion that 2009 is the most likely year that the pipeline will be forced to shut down, GAO evaluated the reasonableness of (1) the minimum operating level that DOE assumed for the pipeline and (2) the model and the key economic, geologic, engineering, and cost assumptions that DOE used to estimate oil production at the North Slope. GAO also looked at the reasonableness of DOE's belief that it will take 10 to 12 years to develop new oil fields in the refuge.
