Local Benefit: Heat and Power

CBC News - North - N.W.T. keeps community natural gas study secret

Sometimes lost in all the discussion of money, jobs, and potential environmental issues with pipelines is the potential long-term benefit to communities near the line.

This piece discusses the possibility of using gas from the Mackenzie Gas Line to power and/or heat communities along its alignment. This is a huge benefit; it's a reliable, clean (cleaner than diesel, certainly), and relatively cheap heating source. The CBC piece doesn't discuss this, but power can easily be part of the equation, too, when cogeneration power projects are built in conjunction with compressor stations.

Of course, this discussion applies to the Alaska Highway gasline as well, with implications up and down the highway. I'm envisioning Beaver Creek with power and gas from the line, and the cost of living and working in Whitehorse could drop dramatically.