In the lower 48 states, we don’t often think about where our gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel and heating oil comes from. A lot of it comes from Alaska.
I never knew it was so big around. The pipe is above ground because otherwise freeze/thaw cycles might damage it. Also, it's easier to maintain this way.
Much of America’s oil reserves are underground on Alaska’s north slope, the flat area along the coast of the Arctic Ocean. There is only one road that goes there, and it isn’t paved. Anyway, it’s too expensive to transport crude oil by road. Mostly we use ships called oil tankers.
However, oil tankers can’t go to the north slope because of the sea ice. So, in the 1970’s Alaska built a pipeline that goes 800 miles from Prudhoe Bay on the north slope to Valdez, which is an ice-free port on the Pacific Ocean. From there, it is put into oil tankers and shipped to refineries in California and elsewhere.
This gives you an idea of the pipeline's diameter.
Building the pipeline created a huge number of jobs in Alaska in a relatively short time, and a lot of people from the lower 48 states moved here. Fairbanks became a boom town, with all of the social tensions that come with rapid growth.
This sign shows how the pipeline cuts across Alaska from north to south.
So, now all our oil from the north slope flows through this one pipe which is four feet in diameter: 15,000,000,000 barrels so far. For most of its length it is above the ground, to avoid the permafrost and to make it easier to maintain.
I didn't see this sign until it was too late.
We visited the pipeline yesterday.
The town named North Pole is actually south of here.