The Alaska Energy Authority Executive Director Curtis Thayer promoted the importance of the Kenai Peninsula to Alaska’s energy needs in a presentation to the joint Kenai and Soldotna Chambers on Wednesday at the Kenai Chamber of Commerce and Visitor’s Center.
Thayer on Kenai Peninsula’s abundance of energy sources.
“The Kenai Peninsula is in a great spot. We have Bradley, the Bradley Hydro Project, plans to expand Bradley, plus the lad that’s available for solar farms, wind farms, and let’s not dismiss natural gas in Cook Inlet. The energy that fuels the Rail belt potentially is all going to come from the Kenai Peninsula.”
Thayer explained the purpose and function of the Alaska Energy Authority.
“Alaska Energy Authority is to try to lower the cost of energy across the state (Alaska). We do it in two different ways, we have urban energy which is the Railbelt. We take that from Homer to Fairbanks. With that we own Bradley Lake, the largest hydro project located outside of Homer. We have transmission lines both on the Kenai Peninsula and north to Fairbanks to help lower the cost by having built-in infrastructure. And then in rural Alaska, we look at their powerhouse and their bulk fuel renewable. So it’s really a mixture of urban area and rural Alaska.”
Thayer also highlighted the cost factors for Kenai Peninsula energy, the funding sources and the future of energy projects.
“Our goal is to keep the price (of energy) down. For example, we’ve announced that we have $175,000,000 that we are going to spend on the Kenai Peninsula transmission upgrades and batteries. That money is not going to cost the rate payer additional money and not going to cost the state treasury. It’s an obligation that’s thirty years old and it’s going to help pay for the improvements of today now that Bradley’s paid off. We look for creative ways not to raise costs but to actually keep them down.”
“The money comes from a lot of different funding sources. The State of Alaska and of course a lot of the activities in rural Alaska. We partner with utilities and others to help provide funding in urban Alaska, federal grants. We also have a loan program where we loan money out and then the money earned is reinvested back into other projects.”
In the AEA’s continuing efforts to generate energy on the Kenai, the Alaska Energy Authority is pursuing a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) license amendment associated with the existing 120-megawatt (MW) Bradley Lake Hydroelectric Project. The purpose of the amendment is to gain authorization to divert water from the Dixon Glacier to generate additional power. The Bradley Lake Project has an installed capacity of 120 megawatts and is operated by the Homer Electric Association on behalf of AEA.
