An Alaska village paying some of the nation's highest fuel prices wants permission from the National Park Service so residents can drive a specially equipped fuel truck through federal parkland on a beefed-up snow trail.
The effort is designed to lower energy costs in the Inupiaq village of Noatak, where residents say gasoline and heating fuel costs $9.99 a gallon, even more than in other rural villages because the Noatak River is too shallow to support the barges that once delivered fuel.
Instead of cheaper barge service, bulk fuel arrives on chartered flights from Fairbanks, 450 miles to the southeast, boosting gasoline and stove oil prices to five times the national average, according to figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
"Even though the rest of the country is seeing much lower fuel costs, we haven't seen a change in two or three years," said Mark Moore, transportation director for the tribal government in the village of 550.
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The villagers take their snowmachines along a 24-mile snow route from the mine's haul road, following a historical path extending 9 miles into Cape Krusenstern National Monument and another 7 miles on land managed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.
That's the route villagers hope to upgrade into a winter corridor, repeatedly packing down drifting snow and grooming it, to support the fuel truck that will haul 3,000 gallons at a time.
The route has long been traveled by snowmachines. Before that, dog sled teams were used to reach another village. But trips involving anything heavier than a snowmachine require a permit to cross federal land.
The village late last year applied for right-of-way permits from the National Park Service, triggering a review of alternative routes under federal law and possibly an environmental assessment. Advocates of the effort say the trail through the 1,000-square-mile monument will melt away each summer, leaving no scars on the tundra.
The initial goal is importing 50,000 gallons of heating oil each winter using the cheaper fuel provided by the mine, enough to meet much of the village's residential demand and make a big dent in costs. Villagers say the shipments can support a small entity that sells fuel locally while maintaining the snow corridor and employing local drivers.
The village hopes the effort can grow, so it can one day have its own tank farms built at the Red Dog port where gasoline can be stored, reducing those costs, too. That effort will require future permit applications to be submitted, and the village is focused on importing heating oil for now.
Lowering heating oil prices would be a tremendous help for starters, said Robert Kirk, a regional Internet technician manager in the village.
"It would free up gas money for a lot of people in the community to go hunt caribou on their snowmachines or go ice-fishing for trout or do other subsistence activities," he said.
The snowmachine trips to buy fuel at the Red Dog mine help lower costs for some people, but not everyone. Sales to Noatak are offered just twice a month, and there's only so much fuel that can be hauled back in a single day, residents said.
Sometimes winter storms shut down travel altogether. Also, people who don't own snowmachines and sleds are at a disadvantage, though villagers try to haul fuel back for elders and neighbors whenever possible, residents said.
As a result, many still often pay the village rate for heating fuel and can plunk down several hundred dollars a month to warm homes in the coldest stretches, residents said. Throw in gasoline costs, and many people, especially those on fixed incomes, have trouble getting by.
"Oh man, it's hard to watch the news," Kirk said of TV reports that the national average for gasoline and heating oil is about $2 a gallon.
The villagers are getting support from several organizations, including Palmer-based Cruz Construction, a company with a long history of building ice roads and snow roads that support huge vehicles crossing the North Slope oil fields.
Teck Alaska, the mine's operator, has agreed under the plan to continue selling heating oil to the village for the cheaper costs it pays.
One of the world's largest zinc mines, Red Dog consumes about 20 million gallons of fuel annually, accepting deliveries by barge at a port along the Chukchi Sea, said Wayne Hall, manager of community and public relations for Teck Alaska.
The mining company currently sells the fuel to Noatak and another village for $3.37 a gallon, an effort to reduce costs in a region that supplies many mine workers, he said.
"Fuel costs are the probably the No. 1 cost for a household, so anything we can do to help relieve that burden is a good thing," Hall said.
The Northwest Arctic Borough and NANA, the region's Native corporation, helped acquire a $425,000 state grant a few years ago to support the project. The money purchased a vehicle called a forwarder, a big-wheeled forestry vehicle that carries felled logs and is designed to reduce damage to the ground through its wide tires.
Cruz Construction led the effort to modify the rig and is donating much of its time to help the project, residents said. The fuel tank was installed on the back of the forwarder, and Cruz Construction plans to train villagers to build a safe, strong snow corridor and operate the truck.
"We look at this as a community service project," said Dave Cruz, the company's co-founder.
The forwarder is sitting at the mine's port, waiting to be used.
The Park Service learned of the project a little over a year ago, said Linda Hasselbach, a NPS compliance officer. The agency conducted two reconnaissance trips last year, inspecting the existing trail and potential alternative routes that do not cross parkland.
If there's a "feasible" route that doesn't go through the national monument, the agency cannot approve the permit, she said.
Hasselbach said snow roads have worked "very successfully" in the Arctic, allowing rigs to cross the North Slope without damaging the tundra. The Park Service will use state requirements for off-road winter travel, such as requiring at least 9 inches of snow cover and deeply frozen ground.
"There's a lot of precedent for the successful movement of vehicles across the snow," she said. "It can be done, but it just depends on things like trail selection and the vehicle."
To help launch the project, the village has requested a permit for a one-time use of the trail after it's been strengthened, so the rig can be driven from the port to the village without a load of fuel. Cruz Construction workers who are familiar with the rig would drive it.
Then the truck could be operated in the village on training runs, in hope that a second, long-term permit that allows fuel deliveries would be approved. The fuel hauling request includes a spill prevention and response plan.
A team of officials are focused on quickly reviewing the permit application for one-time use, said Hasselbach.
"The Park Service recognizes the difficulty the community faces and we're being very diligent in working this," she said.
The application for the fuel deliveries will be reviewed separately from the other permit, Hasselbach said.
Moore, with the tribal government, said the possible alternative routes looked OK on maps. But on the ground, the routes were difficult to negotiate because of obstacles such as creek crossings with overflow, steep terrain and trees. Those routes would add miles to the trip and would be very expensive to upgrade, so they would make the project uneconomical, he said.
"It was tough enough trying to get a snowmachine through," said Moore, who accompanied the park officials on the reconnaissance trips.
Moore said he understands that the Park Service has an obligation to protect public lands for every American. But he's hopeful the permits can be approved soon.
"These fuel prices are just hard on everyone here," he said.