Alaska And The Problem With Pipes

The US has long known that there were oil reserves in Alaska. In the early part of the century when the US Navy was transitioning from coal to oil, Alaska was marked as being of strategic importance due to its reserves. However due to its remoteness and inhospitable environment it was left untapped. That changed with the oil embargo in the seventies. The US needed more domestic oil and needed it quick. People started poking around in the north shore of Alaska and fully realized the potential of Prudhoe bay. The only problem was how to get the oil out. There was too much pack ice for traditional tankers. So what to do. Build a pipe and transport the oil further south to a clear harbor. And thus the Trans-Alaskan pipeline was born. This 4ft diameter pipe is designed to transport millions of barrels per day and has done so for over thirty years. However its future is not looking so bright. And for an unexpected reason. Alaska is no longer producing enough oil. Alaskan oil comes out of the ground warm and enters the pipe at around 45 degrees Celsius, it then enters the pipe and gets pumped along at around 4mph. The pipe is designed to handle over two million barrels per day, and in the early eighties that much was flowing through it. However due to the natural decline of the field, only around a half million barrels travel through the pipe now. And this is approaching the lower limit of what it can handle. Much less and the oil will start to cool too much and start separating, creating blockages and freezing in the pipe. There was a hope that arctic drilling would start and provide a fresh influx of oil through the pipe. All of those plans are shelved and Alaska is stuck with the ever decreasing amount that is coming out of Prudhoe bay. So now they have to start looking at other ways to keep it flowing. Either installing heaters or and insert to shrink its diameter. Or just hoping that global warming kicks in enough that the waters of northern Alaska remain ice free. It will be interesting to see what happens.