ALASKAN NATURAL GAS: WHICH ROUTE TO MARKET?

In this study the recent problem of choosing a route for bringing Alaskan natural gas to the lower forty-eight states is used to illustrate a technique for examining the effects of adding new sections to an existing transport network. The method develops demand, supply, and pipeline-network submodels, which provide data input to a modified version of the out-of-kilter algorithm (MOKA). The results of applying MOKA to the Alaskan natural gas problem indicate that routes entering the Lower Forty-Eight through Montana or Minnesota would deliver a larger total supply and produce fewer deficits than routes leading to California.