03/24/2014
JUNEAU — A Fairbanks lawmaker is asking the governor to come up with a plan to ignore the federal government and build a large-scale coal power plant for the day oil prices spike.
Sen. Pete Kelly, R-Fairbanks, is carrying Senate Concurrent Resolution 16 to ask the governor to investigate the feasibility and cost of building coal power plants on state land “without regard to federal permits or restrictions.”
“There’s going to come a time when a natural event, an economic event, a war, and we’re going to wake up and read headlines, like we did on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, and realize the world had changed. And when that happens, we’re going to have another spike in electricity and energy costs that will stagger us,” Kelly told the Senate Finance Committee this week.
He said the state should consider building an alternative, backup power source for that day, and coal, he said, is the cheapest and most readily available fuel source available. It’s also one of the most restricted because of its pollution.
“The resolution was in response to the fact that the federal government has decided that they don’t like coal, and we’ve got lots of it and we’ve got energy problems,” he said. “In Alaska, we’re 70 percent oil and gas, about 20 percent hydro and 10 percent coal, and we also have the resources that are the envy of the world with regards to coal.”
Kelly said ideally, the state would build a large power plant at the mouth of a coal mine on state land and transmission cables to communities, including rural ones. The plant might not be turned on right away, he said, but would be ready to replace oil or gas if an international crisis causes them to spike.
“And if the federal government told us we couldn’t do that, we could go through all the lawsuits, while we’re providing our people power,” he said. “What we do now is say ‘gosh, we need power’ and then we meet with lawyers.”
In an unusual turn, the resolution comes with a price tag of $75,000 for the investigation, though the departments of Law and Natural Resources have yet to weigh in on the resolution.
The Senate Finance committee took testimony both supporting and opposing the resolution during the same meeting.
Carly Wier, a former Alaska Center for the Environment employee, called the resolution “irresponsible and reckless” and said it wasted the state money on a polluting source of energy.
Lorali Simon, a spokeswoman for Usibelli Coal Mine, called in to testify in support of the bill, reminding lawmakers that coal is more affordable than even natural gas.
The resolution remains in the Senate Finance Committee, as the members wait for updated cost estimates from the state.
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