Sarah Palin wants to consolidate Alaska’s utilities and build a huge hydroelectric dam, but she’ll have to wait until next year to get an answer from the legislature–lawmakers say she hasn’t left them enough time to consider the measures in the current session.
The 1.6 gigawatt dam would be situated on the upper Susitna River midway between Fairbanks and Anchorage, the state’s two largest cities. It has been on the drawing board for decades. Palin revived the plan last year in the face of high energy prices. Estimates now put the cost of the project at around $10 billion. Last time the scheme was floated, in the 1980’s, the price tag was closer to $5 billion. It would take about 14 years to build.
According to the Anchorage Daily News, the dam is the key element if Palin’s plan for “Alaska to have 50 percent [of it's] electrical power generated by renewable sources by 2025.” (Hydroelectric power is not generally included under the “renewable” rubric in the current national conversation, but Palin seems to be bucking that trend.)
The nitty gritty details from Engineering News Record:
The most recent proposal envisions a two-dam operation capable of providing 1,620 MW. Watana Dam, an 840-ft-high rockfill dam, would be built first and could yield 750 MW. An underground powerhouse would house six 170-MW turbines. A second dam at Devil’s Canyon, a concrete, double-curvature, thin-arch structure, would be added if capacity is warranted. Its powerhouse would hold four 150-MW Francis turbines. [...] Power would be wheeled through a double-circuit, double-tower 345-kV transmission system.
A not-completely-cursory Google search didn’t reveal any boiling opposition on environmental grounds.
It’s not clear why Palin delayed submitting the measure to the Alaska legislature. Maybe it’s Levi and Bristol’s fault.
