Alaska Highway June 2012

At the time, we were acquiring large-scale shale gas development projects and frequently traveled back and forth to Canada. The town closest to the development area was Dawson Creek, located inland near the border with Alberta, about an hour and a half from Calgary by small jet.

Although it is a small farming town, it is famous for being located at the starting point of the Alaska Highway. There were several highway construction plans in North America, but after the outbreak of war between Japan and the United States in December 1941, the United States hurried construction, starting in March 1942 and completing it at the end of October. The 2,200 km long road was completed in about eight months, and the United States rushed construction in preparation for the Japanese invasion of Alaska and the west coast.

The Pacific War was also a war to secure oil resources. Seventy years after the highway was built, I was deeply moved by the fact that we were able to develop resources next to the road built as a countermeasure against the Japanese military, and that we would be able to bring these resources to Japan in the future.

In parallel with the development of gas, we have also been developing LNG, and it looks like we will finally be able to start exporting it in two years.