A group of Alaskan residents has begun urging the state government to impose a production tax on high-yield oil fields located above 68 degrees latitude. The group is now circulating a petition in the hope of subjecting the plan – which would only affect the operators of the Alpine, Kuparuk, and Prudhoe Bay fields – to a vote in 2020.
The proposed tax regime would allow the state to tax output in excess of 40,000 barrels per day, with the base rate set at 10% of the per-barrel price of Alaska North Slope (ANS) West Coast crude oil. It would also apply higher rates whenever ANS West Coast prices rose by more than $5 per barrel, provided that the average monthly price remained below $70.
Proponents of the plan say the tax would generate about $1 billion per year in budget revenues. But oil producers and their allies say the scheme would harm upstream operators and hinder investment in the newly-opened Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) and other frontier provinces.
Kara Moriarty, the president of the Alaska Oil and Gas Association, warned: “No industry in Alaska can sustain an increase of this magnitude without causing a disaster for our state’s economy. [The tax plan] represents an extreme policy shift that will undoubtedly have an impact on industry, the level of which we are still evaluating.”