Future of energy in our hands

Palmer holds the pole position Monday as the Alaska Energy Authority drops the green flag on a series of 25 town hall meetings to discuss the state’s energy future.

The AEA’s efforts come shortly removed from a decision by Gov. Sarah Palin to conduct a Railbelt energy study and before our Legislature is set to be called into special session to hash out the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act, a plan to tap into the state’s natural gas resources. Sandwiched between is our own Matanuska Electric Association, which is embroiled in a shock advertising campaign to extort the state into making costly intertie upgrades. MEA’s spurious concerns include a contention that snow-burdened power lines can sag low enough to potentially decapitate snowmachiners.

As the AEA brings its show on the road, 4 to 9 p.m. Monday at the Palmer Railroad Depot, there promises to be much local discussion about MEA’s campaign, as well as other important energy issues. The infrastructure that serves Railbelt communities with their energy needs updating and expansion. How to do this while keeping energy affordable for a fast-growing population may include the most significant decisions that will affect every current and future Alaskan.

“For decades, six individual Railbelt utilities, pursuing individual agendas and fueled by ready supplies of low-cost natural gas, have served relatively small ratepayer constituencies,” Palin said last year when introducing her Railbelt energy study. “As successful as they have been, though, population growth, aging infrastructure and mounting uncertainties about fuel supplies and costs have altered the energy landscape.”

What confuses us is how MEA continues to send mixed messages about how it wants to work in cooperation with the rest of the Southcentral energy providers, yet act like a lone wolf. It doesn’t take ESP to figure out this equation: MEA is not a partner in a new intertie that will carry power for most of the other Southcentral electricity providers and faces being stuck with the responsibility and expense of maintaining the current intertie itself. So, the co-op uses a photo more than a decade old to illustrate a “problem” the state says was addressed in the 1990s.

MEA’s intertie advertising campaign will generate debate on a local level, but the AEA has other important issues that need public input. First, the authority needs to know what we know about local energy resources and how they can be developed to help lower costs. Also, it’s important for the AEA to know what resources we don’t want developed and why.

Now is the time to speak up and become an community that’s educated about its energy resources and future. We value and prize the quality of life Alaska and the Mat-Su Valley provide, and low-cost and reliable energy will be key in maintaining and enhancing that lifestyle for generations to come. Attend tomorrow’s meeting. If you can’t make it by 4 p.m., come later. You can also e-mail comments to energycordinator@aidea.org or mail to AEA, Attn: Steven Haagenson, 813 W. Northern Lights Blvd., Anchorage, AK 99503.