Sustain Rural Alaska

USDA Open For Business in Rural Alaska

2012-01-13T15:21:00.000-08:00

UAnchorage, Alaska, Nov 03, 2011 --

USDA-RD Alaska State Director Jim Nordlund today announced Ms. Tiffany Zulkosky has been hired as the new USDA-RD Alaska West Area Manager starting on November 7^th. The West Area covers the Bristol Bay, Calista, Bering Straits and NANA Regions with the main office in Bethel and satellite offices in Dillingham and Nome.

“The needs of the West Area are considerable and Tiffany is uniquely suited to address them. She is Yup’ik, grew up in Bethel, is well educated and has strong experience in the public arena including serving as Bethel’s mayor,” stated Nordlund.

“Tiffany is highly knowledgeable about the area and the issues it faces. She will assist Rural Development in tailoring projects to improve the economic well-being and quality of life of area residents. Such projects may include funding through our Housing, Utilities, Business or Community Facilities programs,” said Nordlund.

READ MORE: http://199.134.2.19/STELPRD4013321.html

Denali Commission Surveys for Rural Managers

2012-01-10T11:57:00.000-08:00

Rural Managers, whether they be city/tribal administrators, utility
managers, public works directors, or other rural facility managers,
are collectively responsible for overseeing and managing more than
a billion dollars worth of infrastructure in rural Alaska. Do these
managers have the skills and training necessary to manage this
infrastructure? What are the barriers rural managers face in trying to
meet their training goals? Do current rural business education and
training programs offer the training rural managers need? What
additional training and/or programs are needed, if any, and what
training delivery options are best suited for rural managers? These
are the primary questions the Denali Commission Rural Managers
Training Needs Assessment hopes to answer!

Link to the Surveys HERE

Who should complete the survey?

There are two survey instruments, one for Rural Managers who
are responsible for managing village infrastructure, the other for
Regional Training Centers and Training Providers. If you are a
Rural Manager responsible for managing some facet (or all) of your
village’s facilities and infrastructure, please complete the Rural
Manager Training Needs Assessment survey. If you operate Alaska-based
post-secondary business education and training programs targeting
the training needs of rural managers, please complete our Rural
Manager Regional Training Program Inventory survey to document the
training you are currently providing. Access both via Three Star
Enterprises LLC homepage here:

Link to the Surveys HERE

Project Goals:

We know your time is valuable. The information gathered from this
needs assessment will help ensure that the unique training needs of
Alaska’s rural managers are addressed by current and future training
programs, as well as guide future training investments.

Project Management:

This training needs assessment has been funded by the Denali
Commission and is being managed by the Denali Commission Training
Program. Three Star Enterprises LLC has been contracted to conduct the
interviews and surveys, and complete the needs assessment report. For
more information, contact:

Anthony Caole, Three Star Enterprises LLC, (888) 375-7774 ext. 1

Karen Johnson , Denali Commission, (907) 271-1414

Link to the Surveys HERE

Energy Innovation Benefits the Alaskan Bush

2011-12-12T18:45:00.001-08:00

DILLINGHAM, Alaska—Tom Marsik and Kristin Donaldson are building a house a few minutes’ drive from the center of this small city, a two-story model with peat-brown vinyl siding that blends easily with the yellows and golds of the tundra in early autumn. The location is stunning, but it’s only from the inside that you see the building’s defining characteristic: White-painted walls that are more than two feet thick.

The house being built outside of Dillingham by Tom Marsik and Kristin Donaldson largely follows Passive House standards.

[Photo © Tom Marsik]

Built largely on the rigorous codes of Passive House standard, the living space is like a box that has been hermetically sealed, then wrapped in a thick blanket of insulation and placed snugly within a bigger box. Though the house is filled with bright natural light and fresh air, it is virtually air-tight. One night last winter, when the temperature was near zero outside, it was still over 50 degrees inside—without the use of a heater.

Read More: American Association for the Advancement of Science

Dental Health Aides in Rural Alaska - PBS Reports

2011-11-16T20:16:00.000-08:00

Dental Health Aides in Alaska - PBS Airs Controversial Program

A program to train dental therapists to perform basic care in rural Alaska has been met with both praise and skepticism. Health correspondent Betty Ann Bowser continues her series of reports on dental costs, coverage and access for Americans.

Read all the comments on the PBS Blog here!

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Housing Development Innovations

2011-09-02T10:08:00.000-07:00

Atmautluak to launch construction company

by Angela Denning-Barnes on September 1, 2011

Atmautluak Traditional Council has been awarded $798,888 from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to launch the Pikat Housing Development Company (PHD Company) to help get sustainable, permanent jobs in the village.

The award is part of HUD’s new Rural Innovation Fund to address distressed housing conditions and concentrated poverty. The program is set up to promote an entrepreneurial approach to economic development in rural and tribal communities.

Atmautluak will use the award to create jobs as well as bring new housing to the community. As a for-profit business, the PHD company plans to develop energy-efficient, climate-sensitive housing for low income residents. They plan to work with the Cold Climate Housing Research Center in Fairbanks to construct two prototype homes that can then be duplicated in the village. The project will use the local construction workforce.

According to the grant application, the local workers have a lot of experience building homes for the tribe. Since 2001, they’ve built three homes funded by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, built a four-bedroom home using NAHASDA funds, and rehabilitated 17 homes with combined funds. This new venture will train workers on green, energy-efficient new construction.

HUD’s Northwest Regional Administrator, Mary McBride says the project is a great example of an effective public-private partnership. She says the flexible funds will produce climate-appropriate housing that will withstand Alaska’s unique climate demands in a sustainable way.
Atmautluak is among 46 rural and tribal communities in 19 states to be awarded grants under HUD’s new program. The total give-away was more than $28 million.
HUD received a total of more than 300 applications from 48 states.

UAF Sustainable Village

2011-08-31T13:04:00.000-07:00

UAF Sustainable Village Competition

UAF Office of Sustainability

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Pondering Drilling...Wainwright Weighs-In

2011-08-18T13:17:00.000-07:00

From the Wall Street Journal
By Steven Mufson, Published: August 16

Wainwright, Alaska

Two decades ago, a handful of wells were drilled in the Chukchi Sea, but oil companies didn’t think it was worth developing. Now, prices have soared, and Shell thinks there is more recoverable oil there than previously thought.

“There is a prize over there,” says Pete Slaiby, vice president of Shell Alaska.
But oil development could threaten the sea mammals the Inupiat people hunt for food. Several lawsuits have been filed to get government agencies to block Chukchi drilling. Alaska Natives worry that the mere noise of drilling would disrupt the feeding and migration patterns of bowhead whales, beluga, walruses and seals. The draft of a study done for Shell suggests that seismic surveys have already silenced walruses, or frightened them off to other feeding grounds.

read more

Windfarms: Part of the Rural Energy Solution

2011-08-10T12:29:00.000-07:00

By Tracy Kalytiak

Paying the light bill and keeping the house warm in rural Alaska can be formidably expensive for someone like Samuel Carl, who, with his wife, Polly, works hard to support the family's six children in Kipnuk.

"This spring I've been hunting and we have the spring harvest from the tundra out there," Carl said. "We need to collect some greens before they start sprouting, you know. It's better than the store foods, healthier."

Groceries cost too much to buy regularly. Doing the family's laundry at the local laundromat costs $6.50 a load to wash, another $7 a load to dry. What is most frustrating is not being able to know well ahead of time how much fuel will cost when it's delivered - a critical factor for Carl, an hourly employee at Kipnuk Light Plant.

"Here in the villages, we live paycheck to paycheck," Carl said. "The most difficult time we had was when we ran out of fuel and our water supply started to freeze."

Wind could drastically change the way Carl and thousands of other people live in rural Alaska by relieving and someday drastically lessening their need for expensive and unpredictably priced fossil fuels as their primary source for electricity and warmth.

Expensive Infrastructure

Kotzebue launched the first utility-scale wind farm in rural Alaska back in 1997 and in its first decade saved approximately 100,000 gallons of diesel per year. Other remote communities - including Chevak, Gambell, Hooper Bay, Kasigluk, Kodiak, Kokhanok, Nome, Quinhagak, Saint Paul Island, Savoonga, Selawik, Toksook Bay and Unalakleet - are using wind power. The villages of Buckland, Deering and Noorvik, Mekoryuk and Shaktoolik have started to explore the possibility of instituting wind power as a way of cutting the amount of diesel they use to generate electricity.

While wind power requires no fuel, it does require significant expenditures for turbines and associated infrastructure - expenses that are difficult for remote communities to shoulder without help. It is also difficult to find and train people to provide the maintenance the systems need.

Rural and urban communities interested in wind power - as well as hydro, biomass, tidal and geothermal sources of renewable power - received a boost in 2008 when State lawmakers created the five-year, $250 million Renewable Energy Fund, which the Alaska Energy Authority administers.

This year's capital budget contains $36.5 million of that grant's fourth round, slated to help finance commercial renewable energy projects the AEA has recommended for funding.

So far, 133 projects have received funding from the renewable energy fund and about half of those have been wind or wind-diesel hybrid projects, said Chris Rose, executive director of Renewable Energy Alaska Project. REAP is a nonprofit education and advocacy group composed of businesses, utilities, conservation groups and others sharing the goal of developing Alaska's renewable energy resources.

How-To Toolkit

REAP in March released its new 40-page "Community Wind Toolkit" for Alaska. The free, how-to guide for communities interested in wind power covers planning, financing and construction.

"It goes step-by-step," Rose said. "If you're considering wind, these are the questions you need to ask. We tried to put in all the resources for those communities trying to get started - the permits that are going to be required, the general chronology of a project. We wanted to explain to people what they'll need."

The toolkit is online via REAP's website at http://alaskarenewableenergy.org/.

Pillar Mountain Success

Kodiak's $21-million Pillar Mountain facility is known as the best wind project in the state, said James Jensen, project manager of AEA's wind program. Kodiak Electric Association operates Pillar Mountain, which boasts three turbines that are rated at a total of 4.5 megawatts of power. KEA hopes to add more turbines of that size. Those, combined with an existing hydropower plant, will put the area well on its way toward having 95 percent of its electricity generated by renewable sources by 2020.

"It's an excellent wind resource and its large turbines are more effective at turning wind into energy," Jensen said. "There's a real synergy between the turbines and the storage hydro. If you don't have storage, you run at a lower load and are saving less fuel because diesel is less efficient with a lower load."

Smaller communities, however, are pooling resources to better afford the costs associated with installing and maintaining wind turbines.

Launched in 1968, the Alaska Village Electric Cooperative serves 53 villages in Interior and Western Alaska and has wind generation facilities in Toksook Bay, Kasigluk, Selawik, Savoonga, Hooper Bay, Chevak, Gambell, Mekoryuk, Quinhagak and Wales. Toksook Bay has tielines to Nightmute and Tununak; Kasigluk has a tieline to Nunapitchuk.

AVEC recently added four 100-kilowatt wind turbines in Emmonak, which are expected to begin operating this fall, according to AVEC's website, after it upgrades aging control technology in the existing Emmonak power plant to integrate it with the technology that runs the wind turbines.

An 11-mile electrical intertie connects Emmonak with Alakanuk. That and the turbines are part of a project AVEC leaders hope will allow increased fuel efficiencies and reduced consumption by 25 percent by 2013, the website stated.

"What AVEC has done is excellent," Jensen said. "It uses the same (type of) turbine again and again. There's little technological risk and that allows expansion to other communities, with little risk. There are some economies of scale, they certainly have engineering economies of scale. As they approach each project, they've learned things from previous projects."

Wind-Diesel Hybrid

The Lake and Peninsula Borough and village of Kokhanok collaborated on construction of an integrated wind-diesel project, which includes two turbines that can generate up to
90 kilowatts of power.

"They're able to turn the diesel off when the wind blows," Jensen said. "That allows for greater fuel savings."

The village could save nearly 40 percent a year in fuel costs.

Sam Carl's community, Kipnuk, is part of another collaborative effort known as Chaninik Wind Group, an organization receiving Denali Commission funding. Chaninik is working to install 450 kilowatts in Kipnuk, as well as in the villages of Kongiganak, Kwigillingok and Tuntatuliak. Chaninik Wind Group also was awarded a grant to install a 300-kilowatt wind project near Point Pilot, which is in the planning phase.

"The resource is always there, the wind is ever present," said Dennis Meiners, recipient project manager of Chaninik Wind Group. "It's strong. I don't think it ever goes out of your mind, can't you use this, harness this?"

Meiners said wind is clean, available and alluring at a time when oil prices are surging up above $4 a gallon. "That's a major burden for villages, coming up with money for bulk fuel when it arrives," he said. "By the time it gets to the homeowner in terms of heating fuel cost, it's well over $6 a gallon."

Home energy surveys revealed the average rural household was using 760 gallons of fuel a year. "Some of these households were 10 by 12 feet, 10 by 14 feet, very small households," Meiners said. "Some of the households, on a windy week, were going through 30 to 55 gallons of fuel a week. These were fairly energy-efficient homes."

Developing Technology

In the 1980s, the State began investing in small wind turbines to help rural communities offset fuel costs, but the turbines were too small, the economic returns were anemic and the turbines were not well integrated with utilities. In the 1990s, integration improved. On Saint Paul Island, in the Bering Sea, wind power has operated airport systems without any diesel engines on.

"The technology has been developing for a long time," Meiners said. "The architecture is being revisited, applied in different flavors in different communities. We're all moving toward the sweet spot - the best application, most productive, most cost-efficient."

Wind technology now better integrates diesel and wind, enabling diesel to be turned off completely while the wind is blowing. Meiners says 30 percent of fuel now goes toward generating power, 60 percent is used for heating and 10 percent is used for transportation (via outboard motors, snowmachines and four-wheelers).

Optimizing wind-diesel for heating needs will make a huge, positive economic impact in rural Alaska, Meiners said.

"If the wind systems were bigger, we could displace 50 percent of the fuel being used for power generation and 40 percent of what is used for the community's heating needs," he said. "You have to look at the energy picture, the fuel used in a community, to see how much wind it takes to displace the amount of fuel you target. I can easily see very large wind turbines in small communities."

Three projects are commissioned this fall, Meiners said, with each involving five 95-kilowatt turbines for populations of between 300 to 400 people. With an average electricity load of about 200 kilowatts, excess energy will be available for electric thermal storage.

"We're on a learning curve for understanding how to use more, optimize what we have, understand what the best economics are," Meiners said. "Should we put in four medium-sized turbines or three big ones? You might at well install more, spread the development cost over a longer period of time."

Chaninik Wind Group's component communities are stable, long-lived, have similar resources, similar geography, relationships that have evolved over a long time, Meiners said. They share maintenance personnel for the turbines and receive help from State agencies.

"It's about creating a collaborative model on the business side," Meiners said. "That's a model that will allow these guys to have a lower, more sustainable cost position over the long-term, reducing fragmentation of resources."

STEM Charter Schools, Alaska

2011-07-28T13:51:00.000-07:00

As more and more rural communities develop their technology resources, expand their corporate reach into the fields of science and engineering, the need for trained blue collar workers (scientists, engineers, doctors, research specialists) grows.

Alaskan youth are poised to fill the gap and support this growth and development and help their local communities to grow and prosper through workforce empowerment.

At no time in Alaska has this been more critical...the growth of technical human resources is now known to be the key in controlling natural resources, management of lands and the health and welfare of each and every rural Alaska community.

The time is right for the installation of STEM Charter Schools in Alaska, especially schools that can assist within under-served communities where adequate facilities and teaching expertise is lacking.

RESEARCH STEM Charter Schools

Dedicated to the Development of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Charter Schools in Alaska. Discussions on the topics of pedagogy, administration, concept design and implementation of STEM Charter Schools. resources contacts news research forum STEM education native blog experiential alternative athabascan yupik cupiq tsimpsian tlingit eyak chugach unangan aleut science technology computer engineering mathematics rural alaskan high school

http://stemcharteralaska.blogspot.com/

Sustainable Village at UAF

2011-05-19T16:17:00.001-07:00

Cold Climate Housing Research Center. CCHRC, presented to the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) Chancellor a conceptual framework and implementation plan for a research partnership between UAF and CCHRC’s Sustainable Northern Communities (SNC) program. This partnership will culminate in a housing development and living laboratory called the Sustainable Village at UAF where CCHRC researchers and UAF students and faculty can test new building techniques and technologies in a holistic setting, addressing the evolving field of sustainable design. The project will demonstrate the viability and marketability of a well designed, energy efficient, and sustainable housing community for students that can be replicated in other northern communities. The Sustainable Village at UAF represents the latest evolution of the shared goals of CCHRC and UAF in contributing to a more sustainable built environment on both the UAF campus and elsewhere in the circumpolar north.

DEVELOPING A WIND TURBINE and POWER SYSTEMS WORKFORCE

2011-05-14T12:13:00.000-07:00

Power plant operators from the Chaninik region are ‘spreading their wings’. Over the last couple months power system technicians and operators from the villages of Tuntutuliak, Kwigillingok and Kongiganak participated in high level Wind Turbine system operations, maintenance, and tower climbing safety training.

The Chaninik Wind Group (CWG) has been busy training their own local workforce to meet the needs of the advanced wind / diesel systems they are installing in their communities. Their long range goal is to build ‘self reliance, self sufficiency and reliability’ in operating and maintaining their own power plants. Many of the CWG diesel power plants now include Wind Turbine systems with plans to build advanced ‘smart-grid’ capabilities in an effort to enhance heating, billing and efficiencies to each village residence and public facility.

“In the long-run, these guys are going to be some of the most competent Wind Turbine and Advanced Hybrid – Wind / Diesel Systems operators in the state. The expertise they are developing will eventually build reliability in our systems, help to lower the cost of power in all our communities and raise our own employability standards” said William Iqkurak, President of the Chaninik Wind Group and Manager of Kwig Power.

The CWG projects are progressive in their approach. The region has some of the best wind energy resources in the world. The wind systems being deployed will not only supply power to the electrical grid but by constructing a smart grid system in each community, the potential to turn excess wind energy into heat energy for homes and public facilities is possible. While these new technology developments take time to bring into production, CWG managers and operators are on the cusp of these developments and are being trained to install and operate some of the first complete systems of their kind in the Nation.

Renewable Energy Technician and Educator Martin Leonard, of Bethel, helped lead the trainings for IES and the Chaninik Wind Group. “We brought in top US technicians to share expertise and knowledge. Trainings took place in the villages of Kongiganak and Kwigillingok where operators had the opportunity to work ‘close to home’; bringing all the physical nuances of working safely in cold weather and harsh conditions into play. Providing hands-on training on their own equipment, in their own facilities was invaluable”, said Leonard.

To date, 9 CWG operators in the region have obtained Nationally recognized certifications in Wind Turbine Operations and Maintenance, 12 in Tower Climbing Safety Rescue and Access, 10 OSHA Heavy Construction, 10 in Diesel Systems Operations and more. All certified technicians are currently employed with CWG projects in their respective village power facilities.

CWG has plans to continue their workforce training efforts and are developing initiatives in: Operations and Maintenance of their village Electrical Distribution Systems, Competent Persons - Safety and Rescue Training, Residential Electrical Systems, Lineman Training as well as supporting sustainability and ongoing competencies through ‘Train the Trainer’ efforts.

Debating Village Energy Empowerment

2011-05-14T11:59:00.000-07:00

Creating 'real' Village Energy Independence and Empowering community-based sustainability efforts is a multi-faceted issue. Alaska Dispatch blogger Craig Medred reported on one village's effort toward energy independence and compared the current state of affairs with the cooperatively managed AVEC. Great topics of discussion ensued:

Editor's note: In a story May 4, Alaska Dispatch writer Craig Medred detailed the efforts of Perryville, a village in Southwest Alaska, to develop a cost-effective way to harness the wind for energy by building its own wind farm of turbines originally designed to power American homes. Meera Kohler, president and chief executive of the Alaska Village Electric Cooperative, a nonprofit, member-owned utility supplying power to 53 villages in rural Alaska, responded to the story, challenging some of Medred's points. Here's an exchange between Kohler and Medred from the comments below his original story:

Rural Independent Power Producers

2010-03-22T15:49:00.000-07:00

When the topic of empowering village residents and rural households to become small energy producers in our villages...there are always technical excuses for why rural utilities are incapable of providing these type of distributed network capabilities for small scale Solar PV and Wind. Here is a discussion from the Alaska Energy Network...a starting point towards understanding the technical considerations with IPP's in our villages

Link to Alaska Energy Network Discussion (AEN)

There are at least the following technical issues associated with connecting multiple small distributed renewable generators to a village diesel power system:

1. Small PV or wind installations are generally single-phase systems. The utility diesel power plant is inherently three-phase. When individual residential generators start feeding in power (or subtracting load) on individual phases, it becomes very difficult to keep the load balanced among all three phases. An unbalanced load causes the diesel generators to operate inefficiently and makes it difficult to maintain proper voltage on all three phases. This problem can be solved using a central load balancing inverter that will dynamically balance the three-phase load seen by the diesel power plant.

2. Because of the intermittency of renewables, the utility power plant and distribution system must still be sized to meet the peak load with no contribution of the renewables. With IPPs effectively reducing the average load on the system, the utility's infrastructure will operate at a lower load factor (percentage of its rated power). This causes the utility both to lose revenue and operate less efficiently. The utility doesn't mind when they own the renewable generation, since they don't lose revenue, and the decreased load factor on the diesel plan is more than made up for in fuel savings.

3. An objection that used to be raised frequently was that it would be difficult to ensure lineman safety if a bunch of independent power producers were connected to the distribution system and could potentially backfeed the lines when they were supposed to be de-energized for maintenance. With the advent of interconnection standards such as IEEE-1547, which effectively prevent such occurences, this has become a total non-issue.

4. Many Alaska village power plants are still manually operated. The operator knows the daily load profile and can operate the plant fairly efficiently with just a few diesel dispatch decisions per day. When you start adding renewables to the mix (especially wind), the variations in net load become larger and less predictable. To keep the diesel plant operating efficiently requires that it be automated. The system supervisory controller continually monitors the net load and dispatches the diesel generator that can meet that load most efficiently. This is why that in every wind-diesel village power project of medium to high wind penetration, the first step is always to automate the diesel plant.

As David K says, utilities do indeed often have a conservative mindset and tend to oppose change that threatens their monopoly on generation. But there are real technical issues raised by distributed renewables, especially on small isolated mini-grids. Nevertheless, just because it raises issues for the utility doesn't mean it shouldn't be allowed. It is good for the environment and good for the consumer. The village utilities will have to learn how to adapt, just as the big utilities had to learn how to adapt to wind and solar farms on their distribution grids.

Comment was provided by:
Steve Drouilhet on March 18, 2010
http://www.sustainableautomation.com/

Sustainable Housing Project Kuskokwim Delta

2010-02-21T10:59:00.000-08:00

New housing design gets Quinhagak approval

By ALEX DEMARBAN

Some homes in Quinhagak are rotting from the inside and out, said Jack Hebert, head of the Cold Climate Housing Research Center. Many homes have “prolific” mold and unsound structures because they were built poorly and updated improperly, according to a study.

Houses in Quinhagak battered by decades of fierce wet winds might soon be replaced by a new model that hearkens back to traditional Native sod houses. At a meeting last week, village leaders in the Southwest Alaska community accepted a preliminary plan for an energy-efficient home that could be a prototype for other houses in the village.

The octagonal floor plan, created by experts with the Cold Climate Housing Research Center in Fairbanks, stemmed from comments by the town's mayor, Willard Church. He suggested the center's designers build a circular building, perhaps even a yurt, something similar to the soft-edged, sod-covered houses the area's Yup'ik elders once lived in. The cornerless shape would shed gusts that have knocked the village's blocky houses off their foundations. It would also reduce the snow drifts that pile against walls.

So the center's design team unveiled an octagonal design, a not-quite-circular compromise designed to allow for strong walls that hold beefy insulation while still cutting the wind, said Aaron Cooke, with the research center. Church likes the concept. "I think it's a good plan because it integrates both modern building technology and traditional design."

(Artist Rendition, CCHRC)

The need for new housing in the village of 660 leaped into the spotlight last fall, following engineering reports that a sample-test of 55 houses built in the 1970s showed that many were "unsafe for occupancy" because of such problems as rotting beams and moldy walls.

Now, village leaders hope to replace those houses, and they're looking for a relatively inexpensive model that outlasts the Bering Sea winds from the south and Arctic gusts from the north.
They're also hoping it's relatively cheap to heat. "We want to have a house that lasts 30 years and uses less electricity and heat," said Church. "There's not many job opportunities out here, so if we can reduce the cost of heating fuel and use less electricity, that would go a long ways in helping folks out here."
That's where the research center comes in.

The village housing authority acquired money for the prototype and asked the center to design it, said Cooke.

Anatuvuk Pass model The center hopes to follow the same pattern it used last year when building an energy-efficient home in the North Slope's Anaktuvuk Pass, using local muscle and knowledge and producing a home for much less than the usual cost, said Cooke. In the details, the house in Quinhagak could differ markedly from the one in Anaktuvuk Pass. "Our M.O. is to make the house fit the place, so it will reflect the area's unique environment and culture," Cooke said. It won't be surrounded by an earthen berm, because flooding from the moist soil would be a problem, he said. It likely won't require as much insulation. And there'll be no garage where people can tinker on snowmachines. Costs need to stay low because so many homes must be built, he said.

In the Quinhagak prototype, a long arctic entryway will wrap around half the house, acting as a "shield" against rot from the soggy Bering Sea weather. The entryway will sit slightly lower than the living quarters, creating a natural cold trap for a storage area, another idea taken from traditional homes, said Cooke.
The three-bedroom, one-bath home, at 950-square-feet, will consist of a simple design to minimize materials and allow for construction in three weeks, keeping labor costs low, Cooke said. Careful planning should prevent materials from being wasted and allow for a single barge shipment, another money saver.

(Working Floor Plan, CCHRC)

"Our target is under $200,000," said Jack Hebert. The cost would be about half the price of some recently built homes in the village. Best of all, perhaps, each house will use only a fraction of the heat that's normally consumed, slashing monthly bills that soar into the hundreds of dollars each winter, Cooke said. The center will help train locals on how to build the prototype. At the community meeting, residents refined the design, making slight changes, said Cooke. Within weeks, he and others on the center's design team will present a final plan. If the community approves, the next step will be planning and ordering the building materials and lining up a barge shipment, he said.
"We hope to build in July," he said.
_______________

Artist Rendition:

http://www.cchrc.org/quinhagak-prototype-home

Floor Plan:

http://www.cchrc.org/docs/Q_Plan.pdf

Construction Slide Show:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/coldclimatehousing/sets/72157624991900403/show/

Alex DeMarban can be reached at alex@alaskanewspapers.com, or by phone at 907-348-2444 or 800-770-9830, ext. 444

Village Wind Turbines - Technical Education

2010-02-05T22:21:00.000-08:00

Villagers bone up on backyard wind turbines

By ALEX DEMARBAN

A group of Western Alaskans on an empty Anchorage lot clapped as a truck winch slowly pulled a small wind turbine upright.

The Skystream turbine and the guy-wired 42-foot steel tower would fit in many backyards and could fully power a single home or part of a building.

But the only thing this turbine fueled was village hopes.

Fifteen villagers -- ranging from a teenager in sunglasses to an elder in a beaver-fur hat -- helped install the test-turbine during a three-day class designed to show that renewable power is within reach, even in the Bush.

Toward the end of the class, many of the starry-eyed students said they'd like to see several turbines in each village to reduce energy costs and provide maintenance jobs.

"We really need the work," said Stan Jimmy, 61, from Emmonak. "And this work we can do it on our own, the people from the villages."

"These small-scales are the way to go," said Clifford Fitka, an electrician from Marshall.

Last winter, Emmonak, Marshall and other lower Yukon River villages dealt with brutal heating costs and a salmon shortage that left freezers bare. Fitka couldn't pay electric bills that averaged $250 monthly, so he racked up a huge debt, he said.

"My kids' bellies come first," he said.

If tribes could get some of these turbines into villages, he said, they'd free up cash so people can spend more money subsistence hunting and fishing.

The turbines run about $11,000 installed and produce 2 kilowatts of power, said Kirk Garoutte, owner of Susitna Energy Systems, the Anchorage business where the classes were held.

Shipping them to villages would boost the cost, but the package is small enough to fit on a pallet, except for sections of steel pipe.

Still, with rural residents sometimes paying several times what Anchorage residents pay for power, it could soon pay for itself, he said.

The Yukon River Intertribal Watershed Council organized the classes with help from a Department of Labor grant that paid for everything including travel, said Martin Leonard, a Bethel resident who leads the tribal council's energy department.

This summer, the council began showing tribal groups how to benefit from small-scale renewable energy. With help from Garoutte, they took the effort to Allakaket recently teaching locals to install solar panels in 60 below weather.

"This isn't rocket science," Garoutte said.

At the Anchorage classes, topics included using solar energy to heat and power homes and battery banks for storing energy. The students swung by Anchorage's Legislative Information Office to attend a hearing of the House Special Committee on Energy.

The message? Rural Alaska needs cheaper energy.

The trip ended Friday with the turbine-raising.

Outside on the snowy lot students bolted sections of the steel tower together, then guy-wired it to concrete anchors and tied it all to a gin pole that would act as a lever, lying down as the tower rose.

With the tower leaning sideways against an upended pallet, they pulled electrical wiring through the tower and bolted the beehive-shaped turbine into place.

Shawna Noratak, 19 and one of two women, said last year she saw heavy equipment operators raise huge turbines near Chevak on the Bering Sea coast where she lives.

Those turbines, designed to help power entire villages, have sprung up in some villages as utilities look for ways to cut costs.

They're three times taller and far more powerful than these backyard turbines.

Recently graduated from high school, Noratak said she'll share what she learned back home.

"I don't think people realize there are other solutions," she said.

Finally, it was time for the propeller, the final piece.

Three villagers carried it from a flatbed and slipped it onto the turbine's bolt. With each man standing between a 6-foot-long blade, they walked in circles to lock it on.

"Like the oxen in the old days!" someone shouted.

Garoutte ordered everyone to step back.

A winch on a truck's tow bar started whirring and pulled the tower and turbine into the windless sky.

It took less than four hours to build and seemed easier than most do-it-yourself projects.

"We used a 10,000 pound winch hooked to a truck, some pulleys and some climbing rope," Garoutte said. "We didn't need a crane or a fork lift or a boom truck."

Soon after, everyone headed inside for more class time.

Fitka stayed in the cold, going through the electrical work needed to connect the pole to a power grid.

Gunner Gregory, a 17-year-old student from Emmonak, stood over him, watching.

Gesturing like a rapper, he said he's all about renewable energy. He'd love to see wind lots of turbines like these in rural villages.

Maybe he'd get to maintain them.

"I'd love that," he said.

Alex DeMarban can be reached at 907-348-2444 or 800-770-9830, ext. 444.

Renewable Energy Advocates

2009-12-12T11:59:00.000-08:00

by Ted Land
Friday, December 11, 2009

ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- On Friday morning, a group of lawmakers presented legislation showing how Alaskans might heat their homes and keep the lights on in the coming years.

A group from rural Alaska is in Anchorage this week, learning how a wind turbine might be the best way to overcome soaring fuel prices in their villages. The group took a few hours out of their day to join the state's House Special Committee on Energy, which presented two pieces of legislation.

"This is designed to run a home, a single-family home or small business," said Kirk Garoutte of Susitna Energy. "You can gang them up, you can put them in multiples."

It only takes a day or two to assemble a turbine system -- but getting to the point where you can install it in the first place is a much larger challenge.

"You want to talk about off the grid, we're off the grid," said Marshall resident Clifford Fitka. "Wind turbines and solar panels are probably a good way to go for reliable energy and cheap energy for rural Alaska,"

They're sharing their thoughts on the House omnibus energy bill, which combines several pieces of legislation introduced last session. It covers a broad range of issues, from creating a state Department of Energy to energy audits for public buildings.

When considering the bill, lawmakers will consult the state energy policy -- a guidebook of sorts created by Alaskans familiar with the energy industry. It proposes that the state receive half of its electricity from renewable energy sources by the year 2025.

Another goal is to create jobs.

"It's great to put up windmills, its great to put up a hydro project," said Anchorage Rep. Charisse Millet. "But if you don't have local talent that can come in and work on that, then you're not doing one of the things that we have in the policy, which is economic development and then workforce training."

On Friday afternoon, the rural group hoisted the wind turbine into the sky.

"This is something that they can maintain themselves in the Bush," Garoutte said. "All you need is a winch or a truck."

These rural Alaskans say they want the state to make this technology more affordable and accessible. They know what they're learning is important -- and hope lawmakers see it that way too.

One thing some people think the bill left out is a provision for net metering, which allows people using renewable energy to receive credits for any excess electricity they produce and then send into the grid. It's not allowed in many communities, and the Legislature says it's going to leave that issue for the Regulatory Commission of Alaska to resolve before lawmakers take any kind of action.

Legislators are still making changes, so nothing is set in stone for the time being. They're also still waiting for more planning before they finalize the section on the Railbelt. This is something lawmakers will be taking a close look at when they return to Juneau in January.

Contact Ted Land at tland@ktuu.com

These development efforts were created t with funding from the Denali Training Fund - Alaska, Dept. of Labor.

Renewable Energy Partnerships WIN WIN

2009-11-30T14:43:00.001-08:00

The week before Thanksgiving, State news agencies were announcing an early season deep freeze hitting the interior, the coldest temps in Alaska were reported in Bettles where it was a cool, -40 deg F. Meanwhile, about 50 miles away in the village of Alatna, a group of 8 students were looking at a thermometer that read -55 degrees Fahrenheit. Their task...assembling a new array of solar panels and commission them for the new homeowner.

From November 16th to the 19th, the Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council (YRITWC) hosted what was quite possibly the coldest Solar Photo Voltaic training in the world on a newly constructed home in the village of Alatna on the Koyukuk River. The training, a partnership between the Interior Regional Housing Authority (IRHA), the State Dept of Labor - Denali Training Fund and the YRITWC brought together 8 students from the villages of Venetie, Beaver, Fort Yukon and Ruby. Commissioning the array was primary but these students were intent on learning as much as possible about the blossoming field of renewable energy technology like solar photovoltaics. The course included both classroom instruction and hands on application as students stripped and ran wires, bolted down solar panels and finally lifted the array into place atop a 10 ft pole just outside the home.

The solar array the students installed consists of 14, 130 watt solar panels and has a maximum generating capacity of 1,820 watts. A smaller array of 10 panels on a home across the street save's its resident's over $1,000 a year in electric bills. It is likely that this larger array could eliminate the new home's electricity bill for 6 months of the year and significantly reduce it for the other 6 months.

This course introduced students to the basics of Photovoltaic systems (transferring the suns energy into electricity) including those which transfer electricity directly into a community electrical grid ("grid-tie") and independent systems that can be setup to supply electricity to small cabins in remote location ("off-grid"). The YRITWC Energy Department was able to co-ordinate the training as part of a grant through the Denali Training Fund. Another training will be held at Susitna Energy Systems in Anchorage from Dec 9th-11th with villages along the Lower Yukon and the Delta focusing on energy efficiency, solar technology and highlighting wind energy, an important and abundant resource throughout much of the Yukon Delta.

_____________

The YRITWC would like to extend thanks to Kirk Garoutte from Susitna Power for help running the training, to the Interior Regional Housing Authority who coordinated their installation with the training and a special thanks to the foremen and IRHA workers on site in Alatna who accommodated the students and enabled a work space out of the cold. We'd also like to thank the Alatna Tribal Council members who provided facilities, transportation and housing to make this training possible.

The sign reads "Alatna YRITWC minus 58F"

Students who participated in this course were Gary Simple and Lance Whitwell Jr. of Venetie, Ed Sarten of Ruby, Phillip Solomon, Ron Englishoe and Harold Ward of Fort Yukon and Georgine Solomon and Clinton Weihl of Beaver. Thanks for all of the hard work that went into the completion of this project and training!

Links

Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council
http://www.yritwc.org/

Susitna Energy Systems
http://www.susitnaenergy.com/

Interior Region Housing Authority
http://www.irha.org/

Denali Training Fund
http://labor.alaska.gov/bp/dtf.htm

Arctic Renewable Energy Research

2009-11-29T13:57:00.001-08:00

Anaktuvuk Pass (AKP) is a pocket of beauty set in the far north-central region of the Yukon River Watershed. The Inupiat community of 350 in the central Brooks Range is about as remote as you can get in Alaska.

But living there is not easy. Residents endure some of the coldest winter temperatures in Alaska. The region is treeless therefore biomass energy resources are scarce. With no road or large river access, all petroleum based fuels must be flown in by plane. At $8.00/ gallon for stove oil and $10.00/gallon for gasoline, the cost of living in AKP is one of the most expensive in the Nation.

View Larger Map

As in all of the villages in the Watershed, the '70s-era wood-frame houses are poorly suited to life where everyone expects to see temperatures that drop below zero regularly.

The Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council (YRITWC), with funding from the Administration for Native Americans (ANA), has teamed-up with the Cold Climate Housing Research Center (CCHRC), DWScientific and the Tagiugmiullu Nunamiullu Housing Authority (TNHA) to help develop a more energy efficient, culturally and environmentally appropriate housing alternative for residents in AKP.

That means building a high-tech thermal envel h MaxGuard walls (think of your truck's bedliner). Add about 7 inches of soy spray-foam insulation, and set the Mound up earth on two or three sides. Finally, cover the roof with sod. It means orienting each house to capture the sun's heat and deflect snow drifts. It means creating "cool rooms" outside the living areas for butchering and drying game and providing natural refrigeration.

It also means supporting the energy needs of the home through the use of Solar Panels and a Wind Powered Generator. The YRITWC Energy Department staff worked this past summer and into the fall field season to construct and commission a 1000Watt Photo Voltaic Array on the south facing wall of the new home and a 700Watt Ampair Wind Generator behind the home. The renewable energy systems are 'grid-tied' which means, when active, the energy produced will support the home needs. It will also put energy back into the village power grid when energy produced exceeds the immediate needs of the home.

The YRITWC Energy Department has high hopes for the project. Data compiled throughout the two year experimental phase of the housing project will demonstrate the viability of renewable energy systems in the arctic. Given the cost of energy in AKP, the energy produced will also be a direct financial benefit to the new homeowner.

Additional Links to checkout:

Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council:
http://www.yritwc.org/

Administration for Native Americans:
http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/ana/

YRITWC Photo Set:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/martinleonard/sets/72157622326298792/

First Alaskans Magazine Article:
http://www.firstalaskansmagazine.com/index.php?issue=08-2009&story=home

CCHRC Website Sustainable Dwellings:
http://www.cchrc.org/sustainable+northern+shelter+project.aspx

Sustainable Bethel, Alaska

2009-09-11T11:24:00.000-07:00

Bethel Sustainability Coalition

We are just some folks who want to talk about and work towards more sustainable solutions for the community of Bethel, AK. If this description fits you, join us!

http://sustainablebethel.blogspot.com/

CCHRC Sustainable Northern Shelter

2009-07-25T12:59:00.000-07:00

Sustainable Northern Shelter: Anaktuvuk Pass House Completed

Fairbanks– The Cold Climate Housing Research Center (CCHRC) is pleased to announce the completion of construction of its Sustainable Northern Shelter (SNS) demonstration house in Anaktuvuk Pass, Alaska. Construction began on June 16 with substantial completion four weeks later on July 11.

With guidance from CCHRC and Tagiugmiullu Nunamiullu Housing Authority (TNHA), students from Barrow’s Ilisagvik College built the home to gain home‐building knowledge and experience, which they can apply to future building projects across rural Alaska.

“We hope this prototype home, in Anaktuvuk Pass, will change the approach to designing and building affordable, energy‐efficient, culturally‐based, and environmentally‐appropriate buildings for Alaska,” says CCHRC President and CEO Jack Hébert. “This is the beginning of a new day for rural Alaska. This project incorporates ten thousand years of sustainable principles with new technology.”

Located in the central Brooks Range, the small community of Anaktuvuk Pass has a number of homes poorly constructed for the extreme climate, and a shortage of housing overall. The completion of the home marks an important milestone in the Anaktuvuk Pass portion of the CCHRC’s Sustainable Northern Shelter Program. The program aims to work with local communities to build affordable, culturally‐rooted, energy efficient housing in rural Alaska villages by combining traditional home designs with modern home-building
techniques.

As part of the SNS program, CCHRC collaborates with the people of the community on the design of the home, to ensure the home is suitable to their lifestyle. Other villages currently participating in the program include: Newtok/Mertarvik, Point Lay, and Nuiqsut. There has also been statewide interest in the project’s general design approach.

This construction method utilizes an innovative building envelope. The basic technique involves a light steel frame structure with an interior plywood skin. A soy‐based, polyurethane insulation with an R‐60 is applied to this framework. This insulated layer is covered by a spray‐applied coating, which is durable, waterproof, and resilient. Earth‐banking and a sod roof are used to buffer the structure from strong winds and drifting snow. The home makes use of natural lighting, water conservation, and other energy‐saving techniques. To further reduce the home’s need for costly energy, the Yukon River Inter‐Tribal Watershed Council installed solar panels and will be adding a wind power system to produce renewable energy.

The high cost of transporting building materials to rural Alaska was a major consideration. All the material needed for construction of this home was approximately 30,000 pounds and could fit into a single DC‐6 aircraft. An average home in Anaktuvuk Pass uses 1,400 gallons or more of fuel oil per year and can cost over $1 million to build, including shipping of materials. The Sustainable Northern Shelter home is designed to use 110 gallons of fuel oil a year and cost under $150,000 to construct, including shipping.

The village of Anaktuvuk will choose a family to live in the home. Over the winter, CCHRC will monitor the building’s condition and systems to assess where changes can be made in future homes for Anaktuvuk Pass.

The Anaktuvuk Pass SNS project partners include: Tagiugmiullu Nunamiullu Housing Authority(TNHA), Canada Mortgage Housing Corporation, City of Anaktuvuk Pass, U.S. Dept. of Commerce, GW Scientific, Alaska State Museum, Alaska Housing Finance Corporation, Nunamiut Corporation, Ilisagvik College, Yukon River Inter‐Tribal Watershed Council, Lifewater Engineering Company, Engineering and Environmental Internet Solutions, and Demilec USA.

________

Located in Fairbanks, Alaska, the Cold Climate Housing Research Center is a non‐profit institution dedicated to research that improves the durability, health, and affordability of shelter for people living in circumpolar regions around the globe.

For more images of the construction of the Anaktuvuk Pass home, visit:

Photo Set:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/coldclimatehousing/sets/72157621472154550/

Press Release:
http://cchrc.org/App_Content/files/Anaktuvuk_Completion_release.pdf

Slideshow:
http://cchrcresearch.org/slideshow.html

CCHRC Home:
http://www.cchrc.org

Lifewater Engineering Company

2009-06-08T21:36:00.000-07:00

Life Water Engineering manufactures aerobic sewage treatment systems known as ExtremeSTPs (Extreme Sewage Treatment Plants).

Lifewater Engineering Company developed ExtremeSTPs for use in permafrost areas where septic and other subsurface systems commonly perform poorly or not at all. ExtremeSTPs are available in many above ground and below ground models for residential and commercial uses.

At the heart of every ExtremeSTP is a Fixed Activated Sludge Treatment (FAST®) insert manufactured by Bio-Microbics, Inc. FAST® treatment technology is ideally suited to "packaging" for use in cold climates. By applying some simple but vital arctic engineering, Lifewater developed a system that is suitable for use in any cold climate.

Features include:

They work on permafrost and other areas with poor soil conditions (almost anywhere)
They operate at -60ºF (-51ºC) even when installed above ground
They are built in one multi-compartment, super-insulated tank that maintains an optimum environment for biological growth
Bacteria attach themselves to a growth medium and become "fixed", thus avoiding the need for the clarifier found in conventional extended aeration sewage treatment plants
The only moving part is the air blower
Heat tape is not necessary for normal operation, even at -60ºF
UV (ultraviolet) disinfection is standard on above ground units
An automatic dosing siphon (with no moving parts) eliminates icing at the point of discharge
They treat all residential wastewater including "blackwater" and "graywater" from a house equipped with normal flush fixtures, hence no special plumbing is required
They can be used temporarily beside a failed septic system to treat sewage until permanent repairs can be made
An optional data logger and remote monitoring system is available
An optional thermosyphon is available to help keep the permafrost frozen underneath the system

Lifewater Example Projects (.pdf)

Lifewater ExtremeSTP Manual (.pdf)

HydroKinetic GenSet in Rural Alaska

2009-05-17T01:27:00.000-07:00

In-river generator may give Bush power alternative

RUBY: Device shows promise for remote riverfront villages.

By GEORGE BRYSON

Published: February 4

Th, 2009 09:32 PM
Last Modified: February 5th, 2009 02:26 PM

A technology almost as simple as a Yukon River fishwheel could one day power the laptop computers and microwave ovens of Alaska's river people. In Ruby it's beginning to do just that.

Last summer, the Western Alaska village on the banks of the Yukon became the first community in America to tap into the power of an in-stream hydrokinetic generator, a submersible turbine that looks a bit like a tipped-over fish wheel.

In-stream power also gets called "low-impact hydro" and "hydro without the dam." By any name, it may be an idea whose time has finally come.

A 100-kilowatt turbine about 20 times larger than Ruby's is scheduled to be installed later this year in the Upper Yukon River village of Eagle, where it's expected to power all the homes in town from breakup to freezeup.

That could eventually provide a fuel-free alternative to Eagle's present practice of burning about 80,000 gallons of increasingly costly diesel fuel each year to generate electricity.

In-stream hydro is no longer just a quirky, renewable energy concept, Ruby project director Brian Hirsch said Tuesday, displaying a slide-show image of four generators now in production during a workshop on the subject at the 2009 Alaska Forum on the Environment under way in Anchorage.

"Every one of these devices that you see up there are not just an artist's rendering anymore but actually a device that is made of steel and now producing electricity," Hirsch said.

View Presentation Here:

http://www.yritwc.org/Portals/0/PDFs/BIA-12-08.pdf

Admittedly not a whole lot so far. Unlike increasingly popular wind farms and geothermal power plants, in-stream hydro is still a costly technology in its infancy, with lots of unanswered questions. Especially in Alaska.

Can the turbines floating on the surface of the Yukon withstand bombardment by the huge logs that regularly drift downstream? Will the Yukon's notoriously silty water damage their intricate mechanism? Or might the turbines cause problems of their own, disrupting river navigation or posing a threat to migrating fish?

The Ruby generator, a mere 5-kilowatt turbine capable of powering only two households, was an experiment. After one month of operation last summer, Hirsch can report that it works.

"But there's a lot to improve," he said.

On the plus side, in-stream hydro is a simple, highly portable technology that can be up and running in a matter of weeks and might be ideal for remote riverbank communities.

View WebCam of Turbine @ Ruby:

http://216.10.51.82/

The Ruby project, sponsored by the Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council (Hirsch serves as the council's energy program manager), was partly assembled in Fairbanks, then barged downstream from Nenana. Its price tag was $65,000.

That included the cost of the turbine itself, manufactured by a Canadian firm, as well as the cost of a pontoon boat to float it, gear to anchor it, a debris boom to protect it and underwater transmission cables to connect the generator to Ruby's power grid.

Ruby was selected as a test case partly because diesel-generated power there is so expensive, and partly because its residents enthusiastically supported the project, Hirsch said. Ruby also satisfied some technical requirements.

In-stream turbines ideally get placed in the part of a river where the current is strongest. That's usually on the surface near the middle, where the river is deepest. But placing it in the middle of a river increases the length of the transmission lines required and possibly creates navigational hazards. Ruby proved ideal because the fastest, deepest current was close to shore.

To protect the turbine from floating driftwood, the construction team fashioned a simple A-frame prow out of two logs. That was only halfway successful, Hirsch said. It diverted everything that floated on the surface. But some debris on the Yukon floats beneath the surface, and it accumulated on the vessel's anchor chain. Eventually all the snagged flotsam began to shield the turbine from the current and lowered its electrical output.

"It's a challenge, and it's something we're working on," Hirsch said.

The larger in-stream hydro turbine waiting to be installed in Eagle this summer may offer an answer to that problem. It'll come equipped with a heavy, metal sieve-like prow that will extend deep into the river, deflecting subsurface debris.

Underwritten by a $1.6 million grant from the Denali Commission, the Eagle project was proposed and advanced by the Alaska Power & Telephone Co., a Washington-state- based utility that provides Eagle residents with electricity. The company chipped in some seed money of its own.

But it's still "really expensive" per kilowatt to put a hydrokinetic generator in the water when you compare the new technology with more mass-produced renewables like wind power, said Benjamin Beste, an AP&T engineer who also addressed the forum.

Even so, Beste thinks in-stream hydro is a viable summer source of power for Eagle, as well as other small, isolated river communities in Alaska. He doesn't think the turbines could avoid damage in winter or spring, when break-up occurs. Like Ruby, the in-stream hydro operators in Eagle plan to remove their turbines from the river each fall.

And its effect on migrating salmon? "The fishery impact is not really well known yet," Beste said.

What is known is that adult salmon that migrate upstream favor the slowest current in the river, rather than the fastest, where in-stream turbines are typically placed, said Gwen Holdman, director of the Alaska Center for Energy and Power at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

So adult salmon might be OK, as well as the fishing vessels that pursue them. But juvenile salmon migrating downstream to sea as smolts prefer the faster current to expedite their journey, and they represent a potential concern, Holdman said.

The university's energy center plans to study such issues if and when a 50-kilowatt in-stream generator is installed this summer as planned in the Tanana River at Nenana.

And Ruby might receive another turbine -- a 25-kilowatt generator large enough to satisfy about half the village's summer energy needs -- if a renewable energy appropriation previously approved by the Alaska Legislature survives the current session.

Find George Bryson online at adn.com/contact/gbryson or call 257-4318.

Time for Alt Energy...aaahhhh Yeah!

2009-03-22T13:42:00.001-07:00

Top 10 villages with the highest gas, heating fuel prices

MARCH 18, 2009 - 11:15 AM

A recent report on Alaska heating fuel and gasoline prices shows what many villagers already know: That as oil prices dropped this winter, the costs in many rural communities remained high.

Of the 100 communities that the state Division of Community and Regional Affairs surveyed this February, here are the 10 with the highest gasoline prices and heating fuel prices:

Top heating fuel costs as of Feb. 2009:
1. Arctic Village (Interior) -- $9.50 per gallon.
2. Point Baker (Southeast) -- $8.80 per gallon.
3. Emmonak (Western) -- $8.71 per gallon.
4. Hughes (Interior) -- $8.55 per gallon.
5. Kokhanok (South Coastal) -- $8.11 per gallon.
6. Koyuk (Western) -- $8.06 per gallon
7. Saint Michael (Western) -- $8.06
8. Atka (South Coastal) -- $7.99
9. Stebbins (Western) -- $7.99
10. Gambell (Wesern). -- $7.88

...

Top gasoline costs as of Feb. 2009
1. Arctic Village (Interior) -- $9 per gallon
2. Point Baker (Southeast) -- $8.80 per gallon
3. Hughes (Interior) -- $8.50 per gallon
4. Kokhanok (South Coastal) -- $8.40 per gallon
5. Deering (Western) -- $7.82 per gallon
6. Saint Michael (Western) -- $7.80 per gallon
7. Toksook Bay (Western) -- $7.74 per gallon
8. Wales (Western) -- $7.73 per gallon
9. Stebbins (Western) -- $7.71 per gallon
10. Koyuk (Western) -- $7.71 per gallon

(Remember, these numbers only represent the villages that the state surveyed.)

Alaska Energy Report

2009-02-10T11:24:00.000-08:00

Alaska Energy Report

The narrative in this report is designed to provide information to engage Alaskans who have a passion to provide energy solutions, stimulate the Alaskan economy and provide leadership for the benefit of all Alaskans.

Link to the report HERE

Sustainable Waste Water

2009-01-10T16:44:00.000-08:00

Nationally and internationally, pressure is increasing to introduce nutrient reducing, water conserving and recycling measures for sustainable residential and small community water/wastewater systems. Reports of inadequate water quality and quantity are being reported daily.

Over the past thirty years the federal government and State of Alaska have invested over 4 billion dollars installing piped water and sewer systems in remote Native Alaskan Bush Villages (averaging over $80,000 per household) with a ninety percent failure rate because of the high operation, maintenance and replacement costs. In Minnesota alone it is estimated that $1.8 billions dollars is required to upgrade existing community sewer and onsite septic systems.

At the World Summit on Sustainability, United Nations, World Bank and certain key professionals stated that the current way in which wastewater is handled in the developed world is probably not sustainable, and hence the technologies in use are, in their present form, not appropriate for transfer to the developing world.

Systems utilizing separation technology represent a logical option for reducing and eliminating these pressures. Northern Testing Laboratories, Inc., the University of Alaska Fairbanks (Fairbanks, AK) and the Olmsted County Water Resources Center (Rochester, MN) have tested and documented that AlasCan Separation/Composting and Greywater Treatment Systems can reduce water consumption by 40%, CBOD & TSS by 90%, nitrates by 99% and bacteria by 1000 fold when compared to septic tank effluent. The further treated, filtered and disinfected greywater effluent for reuse either within the household or for safe discharge to ground or surface water is possible with the use of the ClearWater System.

This type of sustainable technology has the capability of eliminating the need for sewer collection systems by reducing water usage and pollution loading to levels sufficient and acceptable for onsite disposal with dramatically reduced subsurface absorption system sizing. Total recycle of wastewater is possible with far reaching implications for sustainable development, conservation of water, protection of the environment, lakes and groundwater in particular, building on difficult lots, urban sprawl and annexation.

Financing of water conserving and pollution preventing wastewater systems for homes and small communities is available through the commercial banking system associated with this technology. To provide incentive to the wastewater treatment industry and the public, legislation has been introduced in the State of Minnesota, which, if passed, will provide zero interest loans for wastewater treatment technologies other than standard that can reduce water consumption and pollution.

Published by the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, St. Joseph, Michigan www.asabe.org

Citation: Pp. 182-191 in On-Site Wastewater Treatment, Proc. Ninth Natl. Symp. on Individual and Small Community Sewage Systems (11-14 March 2001, Fort Worth, Texas, USA), ed. K. Mancl., St. Joseph, Mich. ASAE 701P0009.

Authors: D. G. Brauer, P.E., K. W. Crawford, C. R. Elston, R. J. Elston, P. J. Gillen, T. Hill, T. A. Lee, M. R. Pollen

Keywords: Greywater reuse, Nutrient removal, Financing, Pollution prevention, Sustainable development, Water conservation

_________

Conditions of Approval, AlasCan/ClearWater™ Experimental Protocol, January 4, 2001

Greywater Recycling via Separation Technology

Alternative Sanitation in Rural Alaska, Princeton, 1994

_________

Links 'One'

2009-01-02T21:33:00.000-08:00

Alliance to Save Energy

American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy

Consumer Energy Saver

Department of Energy office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy

Energy Star

Environmental Design & Construction Magazine

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab – Building Technologies

Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance

Partnership for Advanced Housing Technology

Smart Energy Living

The Home Energy Saver – Web based Energy Audit Tool

United States Green Building Council - Greenbuild, LEEDS

Grey Water

2008-12-15T14:05:00.000-08:00

What is grey water?

Any water that has been used in the home, except water from toilets, is called grey water. Dish, shower, sink, and laundry water comprise 50-80% of residential "waste" water. This may be reused for other purposes, especially landscape irrigation.

Why use grey water?

It's a waste to irrigate with great quantities of drinking water when plants thrive on used water containing small bits of compost. Unlike a lot of ecological stopgap measures, grey water reuse is a part of the fundamental solution to many ecological problems and will probably remain essentially unchanged in the distant future. The benefits of grey water recycling include:

*Lower fresh water use
*Less strain on failing septic tank or treatment plant
*Grey water treatment in topsoil is highly effective
*Ability to build in areas unsuitable for conventional treatment
*Less energy and chemical use
*Groundwater recharge
*Plant growth
*Reclamation of otherwise wasted nutrients

Is grey water legal?

In practice, grey water legality is virtually never an issue for residential retrofit systems—everyone just bootlegs them. However, grey water legality is almost always an issue for permitted new construction and remodeling, unless you're in a visionary state such as Arizona or New Mexico.

GreyWater Policy Center

GreyWater Tags / Delicious

Greywater Resources

Grey Water Re-use Study, BC Canada
_

Waterless Composting Toilet

2008-12-13T11:58:00.000-08:00

Many people now know about composting toilets, particularly those in the alternative movement who are quite familiar with composting in their gardens, and who understand the advantages of recycling and simplification of our needs.

But to the many others who have not really thought about where their sewage goes after flushing, the thought of composting their own waste is a little uncomfortable.

Objectionable questions are fired at you when you first introduce the concept to someone, and many persons leave the subject still thinking that a composting toilets is a old pit (outhouse) toilet, remembered unpleasantly from camping trips.

Well, composting toilets are far from being pit toilets! They range from simple twin chamber designs through to advanced systems with rotating tynes, temperature and moisture probes and electronic control systems.

They are effective biological converters of human and household “waste,” saving money and energy for the person and community. They start the regeneration of the Earth’s precious environment that is long overdue.

EPA Composting Toilet Fact Sheet:
http://www.biolet.com/resources/documents/epa-composting-toilet-fact-sheet.pdf

Useful Links:

http://compostingtoilet.org/

http://www.biolet.com/resources/documents/nesc-what-is-a-composting-toilet.pdf

AFN 2008 Political Platform

2008-10-29T23:27:00.000-07:00

The Alaska Federation of Natives (AFN) hereby adopts and endorses the 2008 Political Platform of the National Congress of American Indians, entitled “Empowering American Indians and Alaska Native Governments and Their Citizens by Supporting Sovereignty, Economic Opportunity, Education, Cultural and Religious Freedom and Quality of Life.” In order to articulate other critical issues that are unique to Alaska Natives and Alaska Native Communities, AFN hereby urges the U.S. Senate, the U.S. House of Representatives, the national political parties, and the candidates for President and Vice President to pledge their support for the following principle: take innovative steps to ensure that Alaska’s traditional Alaska Native villages remain vibrant and sustainable communities.

Read the Complete Platform Here

Sustainable Alaska Native Communities

Alaska’s traditional Native villages represent an important part of Alaska’s cultural heritage. But those villages disproportionately bear the brunt of cultural, economic and environmental change. To ensure that our grandchildren enjoy the same benefits that we do from the existence of vibrant traditional Alaska Native communities, we propose the following concrete steps to shore up the economic foundations of those communities. Supporting the Alaska’s traditional Native villages is a policy initiative comprised of the elements:

Support the conversion to renewable resources for electrical power and space heating. Alaska has one of the highest per capita rates of energy consumption among the states. Alaska’s per unit cost of energy is also among the highest in the country. This dire situation is exacerbated in Alaska’s traditional Native villages, communities which tend to be rural and off of the interconnected road system. Innovative solutions are needed to support and sustain the energy needs of these villages while absorbing the shock of the recent escalation in energy prices.

The federal and state governments are in critical positions to stabilize energy costs and provide immediate relief for individuals, families and communities in Alaska that have been hit hardest by current high energy costs. In the richest country in the world, no citizen should have to choose between heating their home and feeding their children. While this is a global problem, it is particularly acute in rural Alaska where gasoline prices in some villages have gone as high as $11 per gallon. Our communities are not located on large power grids and depend on petroleum for three major uses: heat; transportation and electricity.

Read the Complete Platform Here

The federal government, working with the State of Alaska should adopt a role that enables the deployment of private capital to bring renewable energy projects on-line to support rural communities. In order to have a meaningful impact, the governments’ effort will need to greatly accelerate the ordinary project development schedule. The government can fill this role by providing loan guarantees to reduce the cost of capital, adopting a risk mitigation role with regard to construction cost overruns, assuming a share of risk of a less-than-expected magnitude and quality of the renewable resource, and by accelerating the approval of necessary permitting. The federal government should double the federal Production Tax Credit for renewable energy projects that serve rural Alaska communities. In order to support the long-term viability of the energy component of the villages’ rural economies, the renewable facilities should be designed and constructed to include support for space heating.

Given the long lead-times necessary to move from dependence on fossil fuels to alternative and renewable energy sources, Congress should continue in its efforts to increase the overall supply of energy by encouraging environmentally sound exploration for and domestic production of Alaska’s oil, gas and coal reserves on private, state and federal lands, both onshore and off-shore. This can be done by providing incentives, such as OCS revenue sharing for Alaska’s coastal communities, as has been done for Florida, Louisiana and Texas.

Congress should work closely with the State of Alaska to ensure that in the development of a natural gas pipeline in Alaska our communities have access to the natural gas that will pass through that pipeline through in-state spur connections. Alaska Native tribes and corporations must also be ensured full participation in the economic opportunities provided by resource and infrastructure development in Alaska, including employment, partnership and contracting opportunities.

Read the Complete Platform Here

Food Traditions and Food Systems in Rural Alaska

2008-10-29T23:18:00.000-07:00

Read the Study Here

The study of regional food traditions and food systems is one way to understand individual and community identity and community health. In part, food system studies strive to identify and understand nutritional, physiological, and cultural dimensions of what people eat at home and in celebration, how and when food is prepared, and how food is shared among family and friends. Healthy foods harvested and consumed locally by local residents make for healthy communities.

As ecosystems change, food systems also change. Food and food choices not only reflect the biology and ecology of a region, but also link culture, cultural identity, and economics. Food is an item of trade, a way of strengthening and defining kinship ties, and a source of stories and many other aspects of cultural activity (Mauss 1925; Nelson 1983; Nabhan 1998 and 2002). Food studies are a priority in the context of interdisciplinary research, as the study of food systems requires multiple data sets, methods, and theoretical approaches that cross disciplinary lines. Food is socio-cultural, it is political, and it is economic; it links and crosses the boundaries of these dimensions.

Read the Study Here

Alaska Affordable Housing Bioneer

2008-07-10T15:20:00.000-07:00

Publication: Alaska Business Monthly
Publication Date: 01-NOV-04
Author: Martin, Gary L.

Tim Meyers has built homes and commercial structures in Bethel for the past 27 years, more than half of his 50 years on earth. Born in Waukesha, Wis., on Dee. 21, 1954, he arrived in Bethel by way of Ontario, Canada, in 1976, and says he made his first million dollars by the time he turned 26 years old.

Because of his success, Meyers wants to do something to help the people in the Yukon-Kuskokwin Delta region, which includes 56 Native villages. Since there is a major shortage of low income housing, the Bethel builder says he has a solution. He hopes to both ease the housing short age and develop an industry to pro vide more jobs to the Delta region.

Meyers builds what he calls afford able homes, "I manufacture homes that everybody car afford, and they are sturdy.

"I think you can generally say that many people can't afford to buy a home these days. Yes, there are some people in the upper end of the spectrum that can make payments on a $300,000 house, but many can't. Dices of homes are going way out of the reach for most of the population, and who wants to make house payments for 30 years. And, with higher costs of fuel and materials, homes are only going to go even higher."

As for the quality, Meyers says his houses can't be beat for stability. His structures might be described as uni-body. They are built from rigid, welded 2 and 3-inch steel tubing for framing material with a 2-by-4, carriage (board) bolted on the outside, with three layers of totally sealed plastic foam for insulation.

The outside is covered with standard (T 1-11) siding. While the insides of the exterior walls are covered with sheet rock, all of the interior walls are constructed from three quarter-inch plywood.

Meyers compares his structures to an ice chest, the kind you take fishing. He says it is like turning one upside down and packing sand around the bottom.

"I can build my homes 30 percent less in cost, with 30 percent less labor, and make them 50 percent stronger than the traditional homes being built today," said Meyers.

"I worked on a special project for the Gov. Walter Hickel administration in the early '90s. I had to build a house that met their specific standards and deadline, and it also had to be energy rated. They were using a new rating sys tem then.

"I beat their time frame and it got a five star energy rating, while all the other builders were only getting three stars, and I did it all for under 60 grand.

"I also did something else they didn't even ask for; I built the house furnished. It had the dressers all built in; I had the beds built in; I had the dining room table and chairs built in, and I even had the stereo-TV cabinet built in. They just couldn't believe it when I handed them the keys."

What is also unique about the homes, according to Meyers, is his venting system. His houses are built so soundly that they need a special sys tern, which also helps with a reduction in heating oil costs. It is based on a basic principal of physics: warm air rises and cold air falls.

In his homes, the cold air goes down to the floor and is removed through a system of quarter-inch-wide slots that go between the floor and walls. That air goes to the space beneath the house, where the freshwater tank is stored, and mixes with fresh air that is returned through the house using a venting sys tem in the ceiling. In doing that, the air also picks up moisture from the water tank room, and when returned to the living spaces, it helps to hydrate the air, functioning as a humidifier.

Warmed old air, from both the kitchen and bathrooms, is then removed through aluminum hoses that pass through the venting system from which cold fresh air comes into the house. The heat from the exhausting warm air dissipates into the cold in bound air to help reduce heating costs in the winter.

"I know I have some new ideas here; some of them people have never thought of," said Meyers. "The trouble is I can't get anyone (from the government) involved; sometimes I feel like I'm too far ahead of myself. I have spent much of my life and millions of dollars of my own money developing these concepts.

"I really think if I can get someone in the right position in government, who really knows the business, this can be something good for this region. I have no doubt that it will help the housing shortage and produce an industry, maybe even with cottage industries as well.

"My dream is to build superior-quality housing at a reasonable cost for the people living in the Delta. Everything is here, ready to go. All I need is a little help."

Another unique thing about the construction of these homes is that about 90 percent of the house can be built inside his 5,280-square-foot workshop. This means that the great majority of the work can be done year-round, and according to Meyers, using properly trained workers, the homes can be fabricated using an assembly line. While the price of his homes can vary greatly, depending on the amenities some request, the house, without lot, can sell for anywhere from $25,000 to about $75,000.

Job Opportunities for the Green Economy

2008-07-06T19:26:00.001-07:00

Job Opportunities for the Green Economy: A State-by-State Picture of Occupations that Gain from Green Investments is a new report from the Political Economy Research Institute, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Read the full report!

The report, sponsored by NRDC as part of the organization's involvement in the Green Jobs for America campaign, examines 12 states and the people employed in occupations affected by six green economic strategies: building retrofitting, mass transit, energy-efficient automobiles, wind power, solar power and cellulosic biofuels.

It makes clear that millions of U.S. workers will benefit from a movement to defeat global warming and transform the United States into a green economy. Download the report, and read the press release, state fact sheets, news coverage (see right column, this page), and a blog posting by NRDC's Pete Altman.

Read the full report!

Sustainable Alaska Seafood

2008-07-06T18:43:00.000-07:00

Alaska is the pioneer of sustainability. Since acceptance into the Union in 1959, Alaska's constitution has mandated that "Fish...be utilized, developed and maintained on the sustained yield principle." This long-term dedication to sustainability has resulted in keeping the world stocked with a continuous, ever-replenishing supply of wild seafood. Alaska's comprehensive fisheries management practices are considered a model for the world.

http://www.alaskaseafood.org/

PaperCreters

2008-07-06T14:04:00.000-07:00

Papercrete is a material made by pulping used paper. It almost always contains various additives (commonly sand and cement) and is formed or molded to a useable shape. After allowing it to dry for a few weeks, a lightweight and versatile building material results. Structures such as houses, garages, or sheds are common. Some have used it to create remarkable sculptures. It can be very strong in compression and highly insulative. Other forms of papercrete include padobe, fidobe, fibercrete, and fibercement.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/papercreters/

In the papercreter's yahoo group discussions include: various ingredients included in papercrete mixes, construction of papercrete mixers, and their use and application. Water proofing strategies utilizing stucco, ferrocement, elastomerics, clapboards, shingles, and various other techniques are common topics. Integrating papercrete into construction and building practices as it pertains to concrete and other foundation types, framing, post and beam, electrical, plumbing, HVAC (heating ventilation and air conditioning), roofing, windows, and other aspects of construction are all important factors open to discussion. IBC (International Building Code), local codes, inspections, and related topics are common. Since papercrete architecture includes nearly all architectural styles we have fun discussing that as well.

PaperCreter's YOUTUBE Channel:

US Green Building Council

2008-07-03T14:59:00.000-07:00

The U.S. Green Building Councilis a 501(c)(3) non-profit community of leaders working to make green buildings available to everyone within a generation. This is the place to:

» Certify your green building
» Join USGBC as an organization
» Join a chapter as an individual
» Sign up for courses and workshops
» Purchase LEED Reference Guides
» Register for Greenbuild
» Sign up for e-newsletters
» Become a LEED AP
» Learn about green building

CCHRC Forum

2008-07-02T15:04:00.000-07:00

In October 2007, the Cold Climate Housing Research Center and the University of Alaska Fairbanks hosted the first of a planned series of biennial international conferences on circumpolar housing and community infrastructure issues. Other initial partners included: Alaska Housing Finance Corporation, Canadian Mortgage Housing Corporation, the International Polar Year Alaska, the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and the Northern Forum.

Forum information and presentations DOWNLOADS

This forum presented an opportunity for an international group of builders, architects, building scientists and planners to discuss common challenges and exchange solutions to producing sustainable, appropriate and durable buildings and infrastructure in the circumpolar north. Desired outcomes of this forum are the ongoing identification of pressing research needs in the field of northern building and infrastructure design and technology, the development of on-going circumpolar partnerships, and a commitment to the dissemination of the information gathered.

Forum information and presentations DOWNLOADS

Sustainable Communities Network

2008-07-01T19:40:00.001-07:00

Robust website networking a gamut of organizations, people, businesses dedicated to developing sustainable communities.

Creating Community / Smart Growth / Growing Economies / Protecting Natural Resources / Governance / Living Sustainably

Alaska Building Science

2008-06-28T19:52:00.000-07:00

The Alaska Building Science Network (ABSN) is a member supported association of individuals, businesses, and organizations dedicated to promoting energy efficiency as an essential component of durable, safe and affordable housing in Alaska.

Our members include builders, energy raters, material suppliers, weatherization contractors, and other building industry members throughout Alaska and North America.

In professional and voluntary roles, we have been providing Alaskans with residential construction and energy efficient building services for over 20 years. Coming from areas as diverse as Juneau, Unalaska, Kotzebue, and the Railbelt, we share a common goal of keeping Alaskans up-to-date on issues affecting building science and energy efficiency.

ABSN is supported by a technical advisory committee featuring some of the most renowned building scientists in North America. Each of these advisory board members has offered his assistance to provide guidance and support in the development of our training materials and workshops.

ABSN publishes a quarterly newsletter and provides technical training workshops throughout Alaska. Many ABSN courses earn continuing education credits through the Alaska State Homebuilders Association and other certification agencies. ABSN can also put together teams of experts that can perform energy audits, make energy efficiency recommendations, and train construction crews, building owners, maintenance workers and occupants.

http://www.absn.com/index.cfm

The Alaska Building Science Network is a not-for-profit membership organization, with a Board of Directors elected annually from the membership. As an association, ABSN is keenly responsive to the needs and interests of its members. Classes, technical support, marketing opportunities - they are all available when you join. To join ABSN just download the form and send it in.

REAP

2008-06-28T13:13:00.000-07:00

Renewable Energy Alaska Project (REAP) is a coalition of urban and rural Alaska utilities, businesses, conservation groups, consumer groups, and Alaska Native organizations with an interest in developing Alaska's vast renewable energy resources. REAP's goal is to increase the production of renewable energy in Alaska. REAP believes that the development of those resources will provide numerous important economic opportunities for the state.

To reach its goal, REAP has adopted five primary strategies:

1. To advocate for the construction of viable renewable energy projects proposed for Alaska;
2. To help develop and implement policies that will lead to increased production of renewable energy;
3. To build a market for renewable energy in Alaska;
4. To foster and demonstrate stakeholder unity in support of renewable energy and;
5. To promote energy efficiency.

REAP is led by a diverse board of directors and works with state and federal energy agencies to help bring the benefits of clean, economic and inexhaustible renewable power to the citizens of Alaska.

http://www.alaskarenewableenergy.org/index.html

Earthship Biotecture

2008-06-19T01:35:00.000-07:00

Earthship n. 1. passive solar home made of natural and recycled materials 2. thermal mass construction for temperature stabilization. 3. renewable energy & integrated water systems make the Earthship an off-grid home with little to no utility bills.

Biotecture n. 1. the profession of designing buildings and environments with consideration for their sustainability. 2. A combination of biology and architecture.

Main homepage link for Earthship Biotecture
http://www.earthship.net/

Water: Earthships catch water from the sky (rain & snow melt) and uses it four times. Water is heated from the sun and/or natural gas. Earthships can have city water as backup.

Electricity: Earthships produce their own electricity with a prepackaged photovoltaic / wind power system. This energy is stored in batteries and supplied to your electrical outlets. Earthships can have multiple sources of power, all automated, including grid-intertie.

Sewage: Earthships contain use and reuse all household sewage in indoor and outdoor treatment cells resulting in food production and landscaping with no pollution of aquifers. Toilets flush with greywater that does not smell.

Comfort: Earthships maintain comfortable temperatures in any climate. The planet Earth is a thermally stabilizing mass that delivers temperature without wire or pipes. The sun is a nuclear power plant that also delivers without wires or pipes.

Earthship YouTube Channel
http://www.youtube.com/user/earthship

Understanding Alaska’s Remote Rural Economy

2008-06-14T14:37:00.000-07:00

In the big, remote stretches of northern and western Alaska, many households keep themselves going with a mix of cash, subsistence,sharing, and other non-cash trading. That’s a world away from the state’s urban economy, and under standard measures like income, the remote rural economy lags far behind.

Link to the ISER Article

Over the years there have been many efforts to improve the remote rural economy—but there’s a lot we don’t know about it. Standard economic measures don’t capture all the activity in an economy where subsistence, sharing, and non-cash trading play important parts. Some kinds of data don’t even exist.

But to develop effective strategies, Alaskans need tounderstand the economic realities of the remote region. This paper is an overview of the remote economy, based on published data. It’s at best an approximation, because the data are so limited. Still, it’s a first step—and it highlights the many gaps in information.

Download full article HERE:
http://www.iser.uaa.alaska.edu/Publications/researchsumm/UA_RS10.pdf

Wind Power in Rural Alaska

2008-06-14T13:38:00.000-07:00

Efforts are under way to get wind power to several more Western Alaska villages, including two where blades should start spinning this summer, according to managers with the largest electric cooperative in rural Alaska.

Seven 100-foot-tall turbines are already on the ground and waiting to be installed in Hooper Bay and Chevak, said Brent Petrie, community development manager with Alaska Village Electric Cooperative.

Four will go up in Chevak and three in Hooper Bay this summer, he said.

The cooperative, based in Anchorage, also recently purchased four wind turbines for Savoonga and Mekoryuk. Engineers will begin the work to install two turbines in each of those villages starting this summer, he said.

Read Complete Article HERE:
Wind power gains strength as rural energy alternative

By ALEX deMARBAN

Published: January 22nd, 2008 12:11 AM
Last Modified: January 22nd, 2008 02:07 AM

Rural AK Out Migration

2008-06-14T13:23:00.000-07:00

The migration of rural Alaskans from village to city has accelerated in the last two years, though the reasons are complex and cannot be easily linked to higher energy costs, a new university study says.

Out-migration has been a fact of modern Alaska life for decades. But with young women leading the way, the annual net population loss from rural Alaska has more than doubled since 2006, according to the new study by the Institute of Social and Economic Research at the University of Alaska Anchorage.

Read complete article HERE:
More people from the Bush are moving to urban areas!

By TOM KIZZIA tkizzia@adn.com Published: May 14th, 2008 12:02 AM Last Modified: May 14th, 2008 03:36 PM