Black & Veatch is Helping Alaska Railbelt Electric Utilities with a Resource Plan that Would Increase Renewable Power Generation

Project Name

Integrated Resource Plan Study

Location

State of Alaska

Client

Alaska Energy Authority

The passage of time and extreme weather conditions have been taking their toll on the electricity infrastructure in Alaska. This is a harsh truth faced by the six electric utilities that serve Alaska’s Railbelt Region, which extends from Fairbanks through Anchorage down into the Kenai Peninsula. The Alaska Energy Authority (AEA) is working with the Railbelt electric utilities to address these strategic challenges with plans that support the anticipated conditions.

AEA approached Black & Veatch management consultants to study the concept of a Railbelt Electrical Grid Authority (REGA). The organization would manage and dispatch electric power on the state’s Railbelt electrical power grid and potentially develop new power generation and transmission projects in the future.

Existing generation facilities are aging fast – 67 percent of REGA’s generation infrastructure is scheduled to be retired within 15 years. Black & Veatch experts determined the available options if the six independent utilities were to function in a more coordinated manner under REGA.

Options included some form of consolidation; the new formation of a cooperative or state agency; or formation of a Regional Transition Organization (RTO) or an Independent System Operator (ISO), which could be modeled after existing RTOs and ISOs in the lower 48 states.

Black & Veatch’s management consulting team also evaluated four possible power scenarios in a second project that involved the development of a Regional Integrated Resource Plan (RIRP), which took into consideration the uncertainties facing the Railbelt utilities over the next 50 years.

Black & Veatch consultants found that major investment was needed in energy efficiency, transmission and new generation (including renewables), and the utilities should focus on diversifying the fuels used. A technical evaluation of the four scenarios led Black & Veatch to a recommended resource plan that would dramatically increase the amount of energy efficiency and power generated from renewable resources over the next 50 years.