Category: ALASKA_MN

There’s a lot of uncertainty in gardening. How will this variety of seeds work? Are the aphids — or the moose — going to kill my crop? Do I have enough fertilizer? Do I have too much fertilizer?
One constant that at least helps take the guesswork out of what you should grow, where and when, is the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map.

Erosion is threatening coastal communities around the state, but until now it hasn’t been clear to what extent. A study published in November 2021 by the state’s coastal hazards program forecasts how much land erosion could wipe away in 48 of Alaska’s coastal communities.

Conservationists filed a formal petition today urging the federal government to expand the critical habitat designation in Alaska for North Pacific right whales — the most endangered whale population in the world.
Today’s petition to the National Marine Fisheries Service documents growing threats to the whales in the habitat proposed for protection. Trans-Arctic shipping traffic, for example, is surging as climate change and melting sea ice open shipping routes, increasing ocean noise and risks of vessel strikes.

The federal government will fund relocation efforts for six Alaska communities threatened by erosion and flooding. Most are in the Yukon-Kuskowkim Delta, where erosion and flooding are pervasive problems. The projects will play out over time, and other threatened communities can still apply for funding.

A paper released Wednesday by the Institute of Social and Economic Research at the University of Alaska Anchorage envisions what the state’s mining industry could look like in 20 years. The paper’s authors — UAA professors Bob Loeffler and Brett Watson — are hosting a webinar on March 14 to discuss their findings.

The report says while the loss of sea ice, especially in the summer, would be beneficial to shipping and commerce, such a loss, with no hope in returning to levels observed in the past 50 to 100 years, despite the most drastic mitigation efforts, has significant implications on Arctic species, such as polar bears and whales. That’s in addition to the everyday lives of residents of coastal villages in terms of their homes, and critical infrastructure.

Alaska’s congressional delegation has joined a bipartisan legislative effort to ban the importation of Russian energy.
“No more Russian energy should come into the United States for the duration of this bloody, horrifying, unprovoked war against Ukraine,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, during a press conference on Thursday.

Gov. Mike Dunleavy has embraced an aggressive alternative energy agenda with several bills introduced last year and one of the potentially most far-reaching of the proposals, to set renewable energy portfolio standards for electric utilities, just recently introduced.

It comes down to the fundamentals of economic development, according to Dunleavy. He stressed in an interview with the Journal that Alaska’s economic centers are not able to compete with other states for business investment, and the people that follow, with its current energy situation, and the problem is likely to only get worse without a dramatic change.

A 2004 photo captures a boat cruising a strip of water where an 1899 picture taken from the same spot shows a giant glacier. On either side of the channel, green trees and shrubs cover a rocky landscape that a century ago had been blanketed with white snow.