Energy
Here, in this resource-rich land, something isn’t right. Alaska produces a considerable quantity of America’s oil, and yet we pay the highest energy prices in the country. We have great abundance of untapped gas and renewables but look at your utility bill. Check out the price of gas at the pump. Remember how much it costs to heat your home. And the financial burden on Alaskans doesn’t stop there. Because of high energy costs, consumer goods get more expensive. Food prices go up. As those high prices squeeze us tighter, it’s harder and harder to pay mortgages or student loans, or to make car payments.
It doesn’t have to be this way. With vision, and political will and strategic thinking, we can ease the financial burden on Alaska’s families. As a state legislator, I led the call for a statewide energy plan and advocated for developing local energy resources. I fought hard to develop Alaska’s gas on Alaska’s terms, and to make sure we got full value for our oil resources. In the private sector, I worked to develop renewable energy resources across the state.
As governor, I will continue my fight to bring Alaska gas to Alaskan homes and businesses. I’ll continue working to build the infrastructure we need to harness renewable resources like wind, geothermal and tidal.
We can do all of this in a way that creates jobs and puts people to work in Alaska and makes us more energy self-reliant.
Traditional oil and gas reserves have been, and will continue to be, critical to the state’s economy. Together, as Alaskans, we must reach out to the rest of America to convince them that we can develop those reserves in a safe, responsible way.
My goal is to make the state and the country more energy secure and energy independent – certain about where our fuel is coming from, and positive that it’s being produced at prices we can afford. Fixing the underlying problem means developing sustainable and lasting solutions, as well as providing short-term relief from the crushing cost of energy bills.
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.
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 at least 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.
Alaska’s Resources, Energy Independence for America
America’s 20-million-barrel-a-day oil habit costs our economy $1.4 billion a day. Every single hour, this country spends $41 million on foreign oil. Alaska’s oil and gas can free America from the dangerous, destabilizing dependence on foreign oil. 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 Alaska’s gas on Alaska’s terms. In spite of evidence to the contrary, 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 (GTLs) and batching that product down TAPS, or using small scale LNG (liquefied natural gas) and trucking it south.
