Wind turbines spin on Fire Island off in 2022, with Anchorage in the background. Cook Inlet Region Inc., which owns most of the island, built the 17.6MW project a decade ago and is looking at options to triple the power output , a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment
They are developing solar projects, prospecting for geothermal energy on the flanks of a volcano and designing a test of tidal power technology in Cook Inlet. The electricity produced from such projects could play an increasingly important role in the state’s economy as climate change spurs a global shift away from fossil fuels.
David Clarke stands outside the shuttered Agrium fertilizer plant on July 1 in Nikiski. The Agrium plant once produced hydrogen from natural gas as part of the process to make fertilizer. Yet, in Alaska, climate change skeptics abound. And there is scant political gain to be had by citing the need to cut greenhouse gas emissions as a reason for reducing Alaska’s dependence on the fossil fuels that currently generate more than 70 percent of the state’s electricity.
“Renewables are cheaper now than natural gas, and they’re certainly going to be cheaper than the natural gas prices that we are going to see in the future,” said Chris Rose, executive director of the Renewable Energy Alaska Project, in 2023 testimony to the state Senate’s Labor and Commerce Committee.Chugach Electric Association, which serves the Anchorage area, relies on natural gas to generate more than 80 percent of its power.
But Dunleavy’s embrace of renewables appears to put him at odds with some of Trump’s agenda. The former president and current Republican presidential candidate once attacked green energy as a scam, and at a New Jersey campaign rally in May, called for an executive order to halt offshore wind development.
“I am very concerned,” Harrison said. “Politically, socially — is the climate emergency going to get more extreme? Are people going to buckle down and get rid of hydrocarbons, or are they going to stick their heads in the sand and pretend it’s not happening? God only knows.” Nikiski, where Clarke and Harrison would produce green hydrogen, was once a community of homesteaders. In the mid-20th century, it was transformed, by discoveries of crude and natural gas onshore and in Cook Inlet, into a hub of the Southcentral Alaska oil industry. The gas was found in such abundance that a Nikiski plant opened in 1968 to process it into ammonia and urea fertilizer. One year later, an export terminal began liquefying gas for shipment to Asian energy markets.
This would be a big deal because storage has emerged as a major challenge for any large-scale U.S. hydrogen project. “We’re working on developing the concept, and then bigger players can come in and take over,” Clarke said.A wind turbine spins on Fire Island off Anchorage. Cook Inlet, which is shown here in the background, has some of the best wind potential in the country, and Alaska Marine Power proposes a large offshore project that would generate electricity for hydrogen.
Studies of European offshore wind farm projects have found they can displace some bird populations, and that turbines, as they do on land, can kill birds that collide with their blades. The island volcano of Augustine rises more than 4,000 feet above lower Cook Inlet. It is active, erupting most recently in 2006, 1986 and 1976.
“I think we have found indicators of a commercially viable geothermal reservoir on the south side of Augustine,” he said. “The truth serum, in this business, is the drill bit.” He estimates the total development costs, including construction of an undersea line to the mainland, at some $500 million. He is convinced this power would be a cheaper option than importing liquefied natural gas to run Railbelt power plants. And his company has a minority stakeholder, Ignis Energy — a renewable power developer based in Houston — that could help to raise capital for the project.
In the U.S., no commercial tidal power plants operate, and federal investments have been key funding for research.