You heard it here first on Daily Kos, and the only reason you're hearing this today instead of yesterday is that I just got around to looking at the Federal Register index for Friday.
President Obama's Department of Energy - Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is beginning the scoping process considering a project with likely over twice or more the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions impact of the KXL Pipeline net emission increase.
The following entities, Alaska Gasline Development Corporation; BP Alaska LNG, LLC;
Conoco Phillips Alaska LNG Company; ExxonMobil Alaska LNG, LLC;
TransCanada Alaska Midstream, LP, are planning the Alaska LNG project which features an 800 mile twin pipeline to the original Alaska pipeline from the north slope down to Nikiski, Alaska where liquifaction, storage and marine shipments would occur on the Cook Inlet.
The LNG processing at Nikiski would have a capacity for transhipment of 20 million tons of LNG [liquified natural gas]. There would be other, new tributary gas pipelines on the North Slope would collect stranded gas main line for transhipment to Nikiski. A pipeline would cross the Cook Inlet [I've already let the Cook Inletkeeper know about that.].
Here's how to get from tons of LNG to metric tons of CO2:
CH4 + (2)O2 yields CO2 + (2)H20
So 1 mole of methane at 16 grams per mole upon combustion will yield 1 mole of carbon dioxide at 44 grams per mole. Solving a proportionality...
16 grams/mole CH4 44 grams/mole CO2
----------------- = ------------------------------
2E+7 tons CH4 X
Solving for X...
X = 44 * 2E+7 tons CO2
--------------
16
X = 5.5 E+7 tons CO2
Which is about 49.9 million metric tons of CO2 just for combustion of the methane to be trans-shipped by the Pipeline through Nikiski. Additional energy inputs [with associated CO2 emissions] that would be considered in a lifecycle analysis would look at the energy required to liquify the natural gas, as well as energy required for marine shipments, compressor stations and for production/extraction up on the North Slope.
Here is a PDF of Friday's Federal Register notice. This is an announcement of the beginning of a scoping process for the environmental impact statement review to be conducted on the project by FERC. Apparently the application for the project is not yet received, but FERC wants to begin the public involvement process at an earlier stage for scoping purposes:
http://www.gpo.gov/...
PUBLIC COMMENTS DUE: December 4, 2015
Once the applicants actually file their formal application, there will be an opportunity to actually intervene in the matter as a formal party in front of FERC, and other opportunities to comment.
This is unquestionably a big project and certainly has an emissions impact far higher than the KXL Pipeline from greenhouse gas emissions.
5:15 PM PT: Because this is an export pipeline for which an export license has been sought, not all of the CO2 emissions would be under United States jurisdiction and accountability for the gas that would be exported to other countries than the U.S.:
http://alaska.realestaterama.com/...
5:53 PM PT: Various news coverage on Alaska LNG Project:
http://www.ktuu.com/...
http://www.alaskapublic.org/...
http://www.gasworld.com/...
http://peninsulaclarion.com/...
http://www.youralaskalink.com/...
Republicans and Governor Walker bickering over this project:
http://www.alaskapublic.org/...
6:43 PM PT: It seems that there is a "stand alone" natural gas pipeline proposal separate from the Alaska LNG project that Alaska Governor Bill Walker (I) is proposing and he's arguing with Alaska republicans about it:; I don't understand all of the politics in this, but here it is:
http://www.pennenergy.com/...
7:20 PM PT: This project is massive. Some news articles are calling the Alaska LNG project the largest gas project in the world, and the largest private infrastructure project to be constructed in North America, at $45-65 billion in cost.
Here is some more briefing material on the Alaskan LNG Project:
http://www.arcticgas.gov/...
9:33 PM PT: The Alaska LNG project would have a capacity of 20 million tons of LNG, which is higher than the 5.25 million tons/year LNG exports expected for the Dominion Cove Point terminal in Maryland which was approved by the Obama Administration in 2014.