Priorities
Lower Energy Costs – Alaskan Energy for Alaskans
Too many villages have long strained under the burden of energy at fifty cents and more per kilowatt hour, and seven dollars a gallon for fuel. Now, all Alaskans know that the high cost of energy is more than just a rural problem.
Juneau’s energy prices go up five-fold after avalanches knock down transmission lines. Fairbanks is suffocating under the effects of energy price increases that have effectively drained the same amount from the local economy that a military base closure would have inflicted. Agrium closes on the Kenai, shuttering a big employer and critical Peninsula business. There has been serious depletion of Southcentral gas supplies, and the cost of home heating is on a steep rise.
That’s why I support:
- A bullet line for North Slope natural gas
- Oil and gas exploration in Cook Inlet and Nenana Basin
- Developing the state’s renewable energy resources
- Energy conservation as public policy
- Expanded research for efficient building construction, and Alaskan solutions for Alaskan problems
- Continued support for the Denali Commission
Develop Local Renewable Energy Resources
Developing local sources of energy makes us more self-reliant and more independent. Wind power can make a difference in 80 communities thanks to improved technology. Biomass can produce energy in 160 towns and villages by turning fish waste to diesel or converting wood chips to energy or capturing methane gas from the dump. We’ve already started using geothermal energy on a small scale, and every volcano and hot spring is a potential power source. We’ve got more coastline than the rest of the country put together, and wave and tidal sources offer great potential – Alaska has ninety percent of the country’s tidal potential. At the same time, hydro projects can make a real difference in the communities where that resource exists. Instead of importing diesel and exporting dollars, we can keep money inside communities and create local jobs.
Promote Energy Independence for America
America’s 20-million-barrel-a-day oil habit costs our economy $1.4 billion a day, and $500 billion in 2006 alone. Every single hour, we spend $41 million on foreign oil. We need to free ourselves from dependence on foreign oil and part of the answer is to increase domestic oil production. Alaska’s contributions include opening ANWR, developing our proven heavy oil reserves, expanding NPRA production, and exploring offshore potential.
Develop Alaska’s Natural Gas
The natural gas pipeline will be the signature achievement of this generation of Alaskans. It is a mega-project for a mega-resource. Whoever Alaska chooses as partners to help build the line, those partners must respect this state as both sovereign and the owner of the gas – and we need leadership that stands up for Alaska’s fair share of the profit, the gas, and the jobs.
Even though my sentimental favorite is and has been the All-Alaska route, I am committed to working with any project that develops our gas on our terms. I remain hopeful that the AGIA process succeeds, and am also following developments that would allow for use of gas in place, whether by creating a giant server farm on the North Slope and sending electrons across the world, or creating gas-to-liquids and batching that product down TAPS, or using small scale LNG (liquefied natural gas) and trucking it south.
