The backers of a proposed 800-mile (1,287 km) gas pipeline in Alaska championed by U.S. President Donald Trump expect to complete a key engineering and cost study by the end of this year, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said on Monday.
The ambitious proposal to transport gas from Alaska's far north to the Gulf of Alaska has been talked about for decades but has received new impetus under Trump, who has sought to boost U.S. development of fossil fuels.
The pipeline is a joint venture between U.S. energy developer Glenfarne and the state of Alaska's Alaska Gasline Development Corporation.
Earlier this year Glenfarne said it expected to make a decision on the project in 2025 and had hired Australian engineering firm Worley to prepare a final engineering and cost estimate known as a Front-End Engineering and Design (FEED) study.
"There's a lot of optimism about the Alaska LNG project, and the FEED study should be coming out in December of this year, and I think that we're going to see a lot of interest in that project," Burgum said during an appearance at an event hosted by the American Petroleum Institute trade group.
Since returning to office, Trump has promised to push forward the mammoth project to move gas from Alaska's north to be chilled and shipped overseas as liquefied natural gas.
Representatives for Glenfarne, AGDC and Worley were not immediately available for comment.
(Reuters - Reporting by Valerie Volcovici in Washington and Nichola Groom in Los Angeles; Editing by Sonali Paul)
