KUAC - Fairbanks

The operator of Alaska’s only coal mine is speaking out against a new Obama administration water protection rule for the industry.

Healy-based Usibelli coal mine saw the Stream Protection Rule as an attack on the industry.

The Stream Protection Rule issued by the federal Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement updates more than 30-year-old regulations for mining near water, but Usibelli Coal Mine spokeswoman Lorali Simon maintains the rule is not about improving operations.

”This rule was absolutely crafted and designed to put the coal industry out of business,” Simon said.

Department of the Interior officials would not comment on the new Stream Protection Rule, but a department press release said it lays out: “reasonable and straight forward reforms” covering coal mining near streams, including requirements for water quality monitoring and restoration. The department said the rule is the product of a process that began in 2009, and included “150,000 written comments and statements, 15 open houses and public meetings and extensive outreach to stakeholders nationwide.”

Usibelli’s Simon countered that the process ended earlier this year without sufficient opportunity for the coal industry to respond.

“We just thought it was absolutely laughable because the federal government gave the public 100 days to digest nearly 3,000 pages — the proposed rule, the EIS and supporting documents,” Simon said.

Simon added that, unlike its predecessor, the new rule does not account for unique mining conditions in Alaska — like permafrost and surface waters frozen for much of the year. Simon called it “a one-size-fits-all to coal mining.”

“So they took this rule, which we believe they kinda tried to target Appalachia, and then they just smeared it across the entire country,” Simon said.

State regulators charged with implementing the new rule, and environmental groups, say they are still assessing it, but Kenta Tsuda with Earth Justice in Juneau points to what he claims is the basic importance of the new rule in Alaska.

“In this state, coal deposits are, in many cases, coinciding with salmon spawning streams,” Tsuda said.

Tsuda does not identify any concerns with Usibelli’s long-operating coal mine near Healy, but said the proposed Chuitna coal project near Cook Inlet is in an area with numerous salmon streams — streams that the new rule may fall short of adequately protecting.

“It may be a step in the right direction, but we’re concerned it’s not as strong as necessary to make sure that coal-mining is not allowed within salmon streams here in Alaska.”

The Stream Protection Rule takes effect the day before President Obama cedes office to Donald Trump — an ardent supporter of the coal industry — and Usibelli’s Simon said the company is optimistic the rule will be overturned. Senator Lisa Murkowski, who chairs the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said Congress will work to change it.

A man wanted on child pornography charges in California has been arrested in Fairbanks. Fairbanks International Airport Police report that 40-year-old Kevin Trask provided officers fake identification during a routine traffic stop on Tuesday, and investigation revealed his true identity.

Trask is on the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s most wanted list. Airport spokeswoman Sammy Loud said airport police are working with the FBI on the case. They have not released why Trask was in Fairbanks.

The most wanted description lists his occupations as paramedic and military, and his last known location as San Diego, California. Trask has been a fugitive since being indicted in 2012 in federal court in San Francisco, on charges of distributing images and video of child pornography.

A national nonprofit group that provides service dogs to military service members and veterans has opened a new training facility in Fairbanks.

Paws for Purple Hearts involves service members and vets in the dog training process.

The atmosphere is upbeat as people and dogs mix during an open house event at Paws For Purple Hearts new Fairbanks facility.

The young dogs, Labrador and golden retrievers, wearing blue vests, calmly interact with visitors amidst the distracting party atmosphere. They’re young and and still in training, but obviously special animals.

In Fairbanks for the open house, Paws For Purple Hearts national President and CEO Greg Sipple emphasizes that his group’s service dog program is different and his dogs are “the most sedate, calming and mellow dogs that we could find.”

”A lot of places will try to have that dog keep the world away from the veteran,” Sipple said. “Our philosophy is help the veteran get through and integrate back into society. So we’ll have the dog come closer to comfort them at times when their anxiety is high- even when they’re sleeping. The dog can sense the dreams, the emotion and the cortisol being emitted, ad the dogs will comfort the veteran.”

Sipple, a former Navy pilot, also points to another unique aspect of the program: use of active duty service members and veterans suffering a range disabilities, including PTSD, to help train the dogs.

”Right now the demand for service dogs is far out-stretching the capacity of every organization combined. So what we’re trying to do is make a force multiplier,” Sipple said. “By having the veterans come in, training with the dogs once or twice or three times, as many times as they really want to — something about that magical connection between a dog and a human being and their ability to read and understand our emotions is really what is the magical part of the organization.”

Fairbanks is one of five locations in the U.S. where Paws For Purple Hearts operates, and the first to get a purpose-built training facility.

With a large veteran population and three military installations, the interior Alaska location makes sense, but Sipple credited two local residents with bringing the organization to Fairbanks: Betsy Jacobs, the program coordinator for Paws for Purple Hearts and Nathan Colin, the director of Paws for Purple Hearts.

Both longtime Fairbanks residents, Jacobs and Colin previously involved in therapy dog work. They saw the need for service dogs.

”I would often be asked, ‘How do I get a service dog?’” Jacobs said. “I didn’t have an answer for them. There was no place in town where you could get one.”

So the couple got trained by service dog pioneer and Paws for Purple Hearts founder Bonnie Bergen in California.

”Once Betsy and I both went through her program, she seemed to think we were good candidates,” Colin said. “She asked us if we could open up a Paw for Purple Hearts here in Fairbanks.”

Since March Colin and Jacobs say the fledgling Fairbanks branch of Paws For Purple Hearts, has worked with four dogs and about 25 service members and veterans.

“Positive dog training — Susan Sampson has allowed us to use her facility free for the entire time, March until now,” Jacobs said.

“Until we got our own facility now,” Colin said.

“So we’ve only been meeting twice a week, but now that we’ve got our own place, we’ll be able to expand our service immensely,” Jacobs said.

“And the neat thing snout our services – all our classes, all our events, everything for the servicemen and veterans – are free,” Colin said. “And if any of them want a dog, the dog is free.”

That’s a big deal as the couple said trained service dogs can cost as much as $75,000.

Paws For Purple Hearts CEO Sipple said the organization is entirely funded by private donations and grants, noting that Alaskan people and businesses have been generous in helping the organization get started and he aspires to expand into Anchorage and Juneau.

Interior regional Alaska Native Corporation Doyon is not giving up on finding oil and gas in the Nenana Basin, southwest of Fairbanks.

That’s despite more than a decade of exploration with various partner companies, including a third well, drilled with Cook Inlet Region Incorporated this past summer.

That exploration did not deliver a commercially develop-able deposit.

”It’s discouraging every time you drill oil and don’t get success, don’t get me wrong,” said Aaron Schutt, the president and CEO of Doyon.

Doyon leases, or has subsurface rights to over 270,000 acres in the Nenana and adjacent Minto basins. Schutt said he remains optimistic for future finds.

“Three wells we’ve drilled, I wouldn’t say they’ve condemned any other parts of the basin yet,” Schutt said.

Schutt said successful oil and gas projects elsewhere in Alaska, including on the North Slope, show that it typically requires a lot of exploration. Doyon’s next project will be a 3-D seismic survey of a 64 square mile area to the north of last summer’s drill site. Like past seismic work in the region, Schutt said the survey is aimed at mapping potential reservoirs.

”Looking for trapping structures really. We’re not concerned about the basin generating sufficient hydrocarbons to have a commercial find somewhere,” Schutt said. “We just haven’t found a structure where the gas and oil are trapped in concentrations that you can extract them commercially.”

Schutt said if a survey indicates a potential reservoir, another well would be needed to verify it. He said the seismic work is slated for this winter, and added that CIRI is scheduled to decide next month if it’s on board with the project.

Golden Valley Electric Association customers will see a slight decrease in their monthly bills next month, but well short of what GVEA had hoped to give ratepayers. That’s because the co-op has run into more problems with Healy 2 power plant.

Golden Valley President and CEO Cory Borgeson said the co-op had hoped by now, Healy 2 would be producing low-cost electricity generated by the cheapest fuel – coal. But he said a small explosion on Nov. 2 forced GVEA to shut down the power plant earlier this month, and that means the average residential customer will see their next monthly bill go down by about 65 cents.

“The fact that we won’t be able to be running this lower-cost coal energy from Healy 2 is going to impact our cost of power,” Borgeson said in an interview this week.

Borgeson said repairing damage caused by the explosion will again delay startup of the coal-fired plant near Healy, this time by up to four months. He says the explosion caused about $1 million in damage to the system that feeds pulverized coal into a combustion chamber. A team of experts brought in by GVEA determined that’s where the blast occurred.

“There was a buildup of this coal dust in an area of the coal-handling system,” Borgeson said. “And, during a process of where we were shutting down the plant, it became oxygen-rich. And a small ‘puff,’ or explosion, inside the coal-handling tubes occurred.”

No one was injured in the explosion. Borgeson did not have an estimate on the cost to repair damage to another part of the power plant that was also damaged by the blast. He expects insurance will pay for most of the damage, which he says was not as extensive as that caused by a much bigger explosion at the plant in March. But he regrets the plant is not yet providing the low-cost electricity that GVEA officials had anticipated.

“Healy unit 2, when it is running and is going, will lower the cost of power for our members,” Borgeson said.

The year’s blasts were the latest in a series of mishaps that have kept Golden Valley from bringing Healy 2 online. GVEA has invested more than $175 million to buy and upgrade the plant since the purchase was finalized in 2013. The 50-megawatt plant was built by state and federal agencies at a cost of more $300 million to demonstrate technology that advocates said would use low-grade coal to generate electricity with less pollution. But it was never able to consistently do that and plagued with problems, so the agencies mothballed it in 2000.

Borgeson said the unusual design of the plant makes it hard for GVEA to solve many of its problems.

“The restart of Healy unit 2 has become a much more difficult, perplexing effort than we had anticipated or hoped for,” Borgeson said.

GVEA management and board of directors talked about Healy 2 on Monday in a closed-to-the-public executive session during the board’s monthly meeting.

A North Pole school will get a new name.

The Fairbanks North Star Borough School District Board of education approved a measure Tuesday night to rename of Badger Road Elementary.

Badger Road Elementary is currently named for a convicted pedophile, said Michael O’Brien, a member of school board.

Harry M. Badger admitted to abusing a 10-year-old girl a century ago, historical records show.

The school took up the suggestion during a work session in September.