Construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System, an oil pipeline spanning the length of Alaska, began.

The construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System included over 800 miles (1,300 km) of oil pipeline, 12 pump stations, and a new tanker port. Built largely on permafrost during 1975–77 between Prudhoe Bay and Valdez, Alaska, the $8 billion effort required tens of thousands of people, often working in extreme temperatures and conditions, the invention of specialized construction techniques, and the construction of a new road, the Dalton Highway.

The Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS) is an oil transportation system spanning Alaska, including the trans-Alaska crude-oil pipeline, 12 pump stations, several hundred miles of feeder pipelines, and the Valdez Marine Terminal. TAPS is one of the world's largest pipeline systems. The core pipeline itself, which is commonly called the Alaska pipeline, trans-Alaska pipeline, or Alyeska pipeline,, is an 800-mile (1,287 km) long, 48-inch (1.22 m) diameter pipeline that conveys oil from Prudhoe Bay, on Alaska's North Slope, south to Valdez, on the shores of Prince William Sound in southcentral Alaska. The crude oil pipeline is privately owned by the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company.

A pipeline is a system of pipes for long-distance transportation of a liquid or gas, typically to a market area for consumption. Data from 2014 give a total of slightly less than 2.175 million miles of pipeline in 120 countries around the world. The United States had 65%, Russia had 8%, and Canada had 3%, thus 76% of all pipeline were in these three countries. The main attribute to pollution from pipelines is caused by corrosion and leakage.

Alaska is a non-contiguous U.S. state on the northwest extremity of North America. Part of the Western United States region, it is one of the two non-contiguous U.S. states, alongside Hawaii. Alaska is considered to be the northernmost, westernmost, and easternmost state in the United States. It borders the Canadian territory of Yukon and the province of British Columbia to the east. It shares a western maritime border, in the Bering Strait, with Russia's Chukotka Autonomous Okrug. The Chukchi and Beaufort Seas of the Arctic Ocean lie to the north, and the Pacific Ocean lies to the south. Technically, it is a semi-exclave of the U.S., and is the largest exclave in the world.