Light bidding in NPR-A lease sale As oil lease sales go, it seemed a bust. The federal government’s Dec. 12 lease sale Wednesday in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, on the North Slope, pulled in $1.5 million and 16 bids from three companies. Interior Department officials looked at the upside: “It was better than last year, when we got only seven bids,” Assistant Interior Secretary Joe Bal- ash said. Still, the results seemed dismal compared with $28 million the state of…
The state’s recession appears near bottom. The economy is still shedding jobs but key industries like oil and gas and construction are showing up- upticks, according to state labor department esti- mates. Petroleum showed a year-over-year gain of 100 in November compared with the same month of 2017, the first increase since oil prices dropped sharply in 2015. Construction jobs were also up 200 in November. In other industries, retail was down 700 jobs compared with November 2017; profession- al…
Railroad: Winter passengers up The Alaska Railroad is enjoying a nice surge in winter ridership, much of it related to growth in winter tourism, Anchorage Daily News writer Annie Zak reported. The railroad is operating passenger service for 102 days this winter, in contrast with 66 days during the winter of 2012-2013. Winter ridership increased by a third from 2015-2016 to 2016-2017, and tour operators are reporting increasing business. Many winter visitors are coming from China, and the U.S.-China trade…
Viking Lumber manufacturing Viking Lumber, operator of two sawmills in South- east Alaska, is now making a “firelog” for heating in homes and businesses and distributing them in retail outlets in Southcentral Alaska. The product is made from waste trimmings and sawdust left from Vi- king’s primary wood products such as lumber, and is manufactured through a compression technique with- out chemicals or binders. The product burns hotter and longer than ordinary logs, according to Tongass Wholesale Distribution, a company…
Coastal Villages’ worker bonuses Coastal Villages Region Fund, a western Alaska Community Development Quota group, will pay $100,000 in bonuses to 640 youth workers employed last summer on various community job in villages in CVRF’s region. Bonuses averaged $156 per youth worker, who were between 14 and 19 years old. CVRF engages in offshore fishing in federally-man- aged waters off Alaska’s coasts. Concerns over Kodiak rockets Kodiak fishermen are voicing concerns over closures of fishing near Narrow Cape, on the…
Governor cites lower oil prices in budget plan Gov. Mike Dunleavy submitted former Gov. Bill Walker’s proposed $11.5 billion FY 2020 budget on Dec. 15 as a “placeholder” to meet the statutory deadline for submitting a budget. The full 2018 revenue forecast was also released, but there differences with the preliminary forecast released by Walker two weeks earlier, just before Dunlevy took office. The Dec. 15 budget assumes a $64-per-barrel average oil price for Fiscal 2020, the budget year beginning…
The U.S. Interior Department estimates that full development of lands with oil potential in the Arc- tic National Wildlife Refuge could result in $3.04 billion per year to the state of Alaska and $52 mil- lion yearly to the North Slope Borough, according to the newly-released Draft Environmental Impact Statement, or DEIS, for ANWR leasing. If lease sales are held in 2019 or 2020 it would still take a decade or more for exploration and development of discoveries, the DEIS…