Pipelines key to preventing Las Vegas-area fuel crisis

New petroleum pipelines from California and Arizona could shore up southern Nevada’s precarious fuel supply within a few years, if someone builds them, the head of a southern Nevada fuel supply task force said.

Randy Walker, county airport manager and chief of the Clark County Blue Ribbon Fuel Commission, told the Clark County Commission on Tuesday that calling for more fuel supplies and keeping pressure on pipeline builders will be key to preventing a fuel crisis in the Las Vegas area.

The fuel supply study panel was created in October 2005 to consider ways to increase and diversify fuel supplies for a region now served by parallel pipelines from Colton, Calif.

At full capacity, the two Kinder Morgan Energy Partners pipelines carry some 140,000 barrels per day of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel more than 200 miles to the Las Vegas area.

AP