Trans Alaska Pipeline System - The Facts
TAPS Facts
When your pipeline is 800-miles long, has operated for more than 45 years, was one of the world’s largest construction projects in history, and remains a modern engineering marvel today, you have countless stories to tell and information to share.
In this TAPS Facts section of the website, you can dive into deeper levels of information about the TAPS tale: the history, the work, the people (and animals!), and more. It’s all populated by the TAPS Factbook, a literal — and little — book that is updated and published regularly by Alyeska. And at 60-plus pages, it is packed with TAPS tidbits and timelines, milestones and minutiae, listed from A to Z. The TAPS Facts section brings some of those pages and topics to life.
To get you started, check out some Fast TAPS Facts in the block below and TAPS Fact Tidbits here or on the dropdown menu. Then explore the TAPS Facts dropdown menu at the top of this page to find a variety of special categories to learn more about. And read or download the 2021 TAPS Factbook here.
Fast Facts
Air Temperature Range Along Route: -80 degrees Fahrenheit to 95 degrees Fahrenheit.
Diameter of Pipe: 48 inches.
Elevations, Highest:
- Atigun Pass: 4,739 feet (crest, pipeline MP 6).
- Isabel Pass: 3,420
- Thompson Pass: 2,812
Grade, Maximum: 145 percent (55 degrees) at Thompson Pass.
Length of Line: 800 miles (1,288 kilometers); includes 407 feet added in MP 200 reroute, April 22, 1985.
Linefill Volume: 9,059,057 barrels. This number differs with the “Linefill” (9,059,622 barrels).
Mountain Ranges Crossed, North to South (three): Brooks Range, Alaska Range, Chugach Range.
Number of Gallons in a Barrel: 42.
Right-of-Way Widths:
- Federal land: 54 feet (buried pipe); 64 feet (elevated pipe).
- State land: 100
- Private land: 54 feet to 300 feet
River and Stream Crossings: 34 major, nearly 500 others.
Valves: 178.
Vertical Support Members (VSMs): 78,000
Work Pad, Length: 790 miles.
Years Built: 1974 to 1977.