energy updates for october 2025
Happy October, folks!
As many of us are winding down summer projects and getting ready to hunker down for winter, things in the energy world are not slowing down! In this newsletter, we give an exciting update on GVEA’s recent agreement to purchase new wind power, we have a report back from a live event on the economic outlook of the AK LNG pipeline project (spoiler: it’s not good), some other updates on ways to get involved with your local energy utility, an adorable picture of a dog in costume, and an important call for a picture of YOUR pet in costume. Read on for more!
GVEA Wind Update
GVEA is continuing negotiations with two potential developers in an attempt to ensure the Delta Wind project begins construction by the federal administration's new July 2026 deadline. At September’s GVEA board meeting, CEO Travis Million announced that they are making “rapid progress” to ensure all funding can be utilized. — . Every member's voice matters in our race against this energy crisis, rolling blackouts, and infrastructure failure. Call your board member and remind them that Fairbanks needs renewable energy NOW!
Brief explanation of tax credits
With the Big Bad Bill passing earlier this year, the former 2030’s deadline for clean energy projects to take advantage of the tax credits and funding offered by the Inflation Reduction Act was moved to July of 2026! This means that projects falling under this category, including GVEA’s Delta Wind project, will need to begin construction by July 2026 or lose the 30%-50% in funding from IRA tax and production credits.
GVEA was awarded a $100 million partially forgivable loan through the PACE (Powering Affordable Clean Energy) program. While the program was temporarily paused earlier this year, the funding is still available and is a valuable opportunity that GVEA’s ratepayers can’t afford to waste. In GVEA’s September 30th public board meeting, board director, Tom DeLong, told members, “we have contracts, we have awards,”expressing hopefulness regarding the timely utilization of the PACE awards.
LOCAL LEARNING OPPORTUNITY
Would you like to learn more about Solar Electric?
Tanana Chiefs Conference will have a free, week-long course in solar design and installation, in partnership with UAF. It will be held at the TCC Tribal Hall in Fairbanks from October 20-25.
For more information,
email uaf-bbcinfo@alaska.edu
LNG EVENT RECAP
The KING! (Keep it IN the Ground!) working group helped host a watch party with the Sierra Club about the economics behind the Alaska Liquid Natural Gas (AK LNG) pipeline. About 30 people attended our local watch party which included free food and some games before the event. The two speakers, Stan Jones (author of the Alaska's Pointless Pipedream Report) and Larry Persily put it bluntly: there is no economically feasible version of the AK LNG project. There are zero private backers to help pay the $44-85 billion price tag. There are no buyers (including South Korea and Japan, nations that Trump has touted are “interested”). If construction started today, it would be - at best - over a decade before it produced any LNG, meaning it would do nothing to address our current energy crisis. Worse yet, the only people willing to work on this project - Glenfarne Group - is woefully undersized for the task! They have a total of 50 employees for a project that will need tens of thousands. Our last megaproject like this - the TAPS - was originally estimated at $1 billion, with a final cost of $8 billion. And that had big name investors behind it (many of whom nearly went bankrupt). Unless there is massive investment from the government, there is no way to build it. And even if it does get built, Alaskans like you will be the one paying the price tag for decades to come while oil and gas companies profit from it.
If you’d like to do something about this, reach out to your federal (Begich, Sullivan, and Murkowski) and state representatives and let them know you’re against the AK LNG project.
MORE UPDATES & WAYS TO GET INVOLVED
Looking for GVEA Board Candidates
The GVEA board’s District 3 seat is up next year, and we’re looking for people in this district who are interested in running. District 3 includes the Riverview/Westgate area, Dale Rd area, South Fairbanks, most of Chena Pump on the river side, the Van Horn area, and a good portion of Badger Road. Check out the map here. If you know someone in this district who you think might make a good candidate, let us know! Email lee@fbxclimateaction.org with candidate ideas, or if you want more information on running yourself!
GVEA Community Meetings
From AETP: "GVEA has released a schedule for community meetings on its upcoming rate case. The meetings will include a presentation on the rate case and time for members’ questions and comments. Meetings will be held in Fairbanks (Oct. 14), North Pole (Oct. 16), Healy (Oct. 20), Delta (Oct. 22), and Nenana (Oct. 23). More information is available on GVEA’s Rate Case page. https://www.gvea.com/rate-case/
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ALPHABET EXPLAINER
IRA: Inflation Reduction Act - The IRA is a federal budget bill signed into law in 2022 by the Biden Administration. Among other provisions, it is intended to strengthen domestic energy production, particularly clean energy. The IRA notably extended the previous Investment Tax Credit and Production Tax Credit to tax-exempt entities like our cooperative electric utilities.
OBBBA: The One Big Beautiful Bill Act - The OBBBA is a tax and spending bill signed into law on July 4, 2025. Heavily championed by the Trump Administration, it permanently sunsets many of the clean energy tax credits that were part of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.
PACE: The Powering Affordable Clean Energy Program - The PACE program began in 2023, to support major investments in clean energy infrastructure for rural electric utilities.
GVEA: Golden Valley Electric Association — Interior Alaska’s local energy co-op. GVEA is made up of a board elected by membership, and anyone whose name is on an electric bill is a member.
KING!: Keep It IN the Ground! working group — A working group of FCAC advancing a just transition to a socially and environmentally regenerative economy. This working group acts to mount popular grassroots campaigns to end fossil fuel extraction in our state.
TAPS - The Trans Alaska Pipeline System is one of the largest pipeline systems in the world, which transports oil from Alaska's North Slope to Valdez for export by ship. Commissioned in 1977. Operated by Alyeska Pipeline Service Company (partnership of multiple oil companies including ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, Hilcorp).
LNG: Liquified Natural Gas — LNG is natural gas that has been cooled to a liquid state (liquefied), to about -260° Fahrenheit, for shipping and storage. The volume of natural gas in a liquid state is about 600 times smaller than its volume in a gaseous state (in natural gas pipelines). The liquefaction process, developed in the 19th century, makes it possible to transport natural gas to places natural gas pipelines do not reach and to use natural gas as a transportation fuel. From the US Energy Information Administration.
FUN STUFF
This is Jackson Mississippi Justice dressed up as a 95lb pumpkin. The costume wearing never lasts very long because he refuses to walk on a leash while in costume and instead hides under the bed until Lee lures him out with promises to take it off.
For our next newsletter, we’d like to feature YOUR pet in costume! Send us your best pet-in-costume pics and we’ll feature the top three in our next energy newsletter. Bonus points if the costume is renewable energy-themed, or a renewable energy source is featured in the photo. We’ll also consider bonus points for creative fossil-fuel villain costumes. Alaska Gasline Development Corporation president Frank Richards knocking on your door, looking for money for a pipeline? Now THAT’s scary!
