Trans-Alaska Pipeline System Trans-Alaska Pipeline System The Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS) includes the trans-Alaska crude-oil pipeline, 11 pump stations, several hundred miles of feeder pipelines, and the Valdez Marine Terminal. TAPS is one of the world's largest pipeline systems. It is commonly called the Alaska pipeline, trans-Alaska pipeline, or Alyeska pipeline, (or the pipeline as referred to in Alaska), but those terms technically apply only to the of the pipeline with the diameter of 48 inches (122 cm) that conveys oil from Prudhoe Bay, to Valdez, Alaska. The crude oil pipeline is privately owned by the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company. The pipeline was
Construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System cost $1.4 billion. The percentage of the pipeline owned by various companies has changed over time, but as of 2009, the primary owner was BP, which controls 46.93 percent of the pipeline. Second is ConocoPhillips Transportation Alaska Inc. with 28.29 percent, followed in order by ExxonMobil (20.34 percent), Koch Alaska Pipeline Company (3.08 percent), and Unocal Pipeline Company (1.36 percent). The pipeline also has had a human toll. Thirty-two Alyeska or contract workers were killed during the construction project. That figure does not include common carrier fatalities. Since the pipeline began operating in 1977, 10 people have been killed while