Agreement with Japanese company boosts fortunes of planned hydropower project near Alaska’s capital, developers say

A brand new settlement with Japan’s main hydroelectric operator will give the long-planned Sweetheart Lake challenge south of Juneau a lift towards improvement, builders selling the challenge stated on Thursday.

The settlement is between Juneau Hydropower, the company planning the Sweetheart Lake hydro challenge, and J-Energy, a significant Japanese hydroelectric firm.

The Sweetheart Lake challenge is deliberate and permitted for a website about 30 miles south of Juneau within the Tongass Nationwide Forest; J-Energy, which signed the challenge improvement settlement in July, constructed and owns and operates 61 hydroelectric services, and it operates 1,500 miles of transmission traces in Japan, representatives of the businesses stated at an Anchorage information convention held Thursday.

“What it does is it permits us to accomplice with a group participant who’s received a particularly deep bench,” Duff Mitchell, managing director of Juneau Hydropower, stated in an interview on Friday.

The Sweetheart Lake challenge would have a capability of 19.8 megawatts and guarantees to spice up Juneau’s power era by a fifth, in response to Mitchell’s estimates. The price is estimated at over $200 million.

Beneath the joint improvement settlement, J-Energy can have some possession share within the challenge, however that share is but to be decided, Mitchell stated.

The cornerstone consumer might be Coeur Alaska’s Kensington mine, a gold producer north of Juneau.

On the Anchorage information convention held Thursday, Stephen Ball, Coeur Alaska’s normal supervisor, referred to as the prospect “thrilling.”

“From our perspective, the chance to deliver clear hydropower to Kensington is a root driving pressure for us. It offers us the chance to get off of diesel energy and onto clear power,” Ball stated.

Past Kensington, Mitchell stated, there is a chance for Juneau’s electrical utility, Alaska Electrical Gentle and Energy.

Moreover, it should assist deliver Juneau nearer to the targets of its 2011 local weather motion plan, which requires a 25% discount in greenhouse gasoline emissions by 2032, Mitchell stated.

Development is predicted to begin subsequent 12 months, with operations beginning two or three years after then, Mitchell stated.

The Sweetheart Lake challenge has been within the works for greater than a decade.

The preliminary software for a license from the Federal Vitality Regulatory Fee was filed in 2009. From then till 2016, the method went via quite a few allowing steps, together with an environmental impression assertion. All required permits had been accomplished by 2016, Mitchell stated.

To adjust to the Roadless Rule within the Tongass, the challenge was designed with a tunnel for use because the transportation route for automobiles and gear transferring from the near-tidewater energy station to the water-supply lake. After building, gear that’s wanted for operations might be left on the higher finish of the tunnel, whereas building gear not wanted might be pushed all the way down to the facility station website, Mitchell stated. After that, the tunnel might be transformed to a line for water transport, he stated.

“We needed to be somewhat bit artistic,” Mitchell stated

Although the challenge is situated south of Juneau, it requires transmission north. The plan is for an 8.6-mile transmission line from the facility plant to the present Juneau grid, after which a 31-mile transmission line north from there to the Kensington mine.