ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – The Village of Solomon, a tribal corporation based in Nome, is hoping to boost their energy security and lower fuel costs by installing nine solar arrays over the next several years.

The project is in part funded by a Climate Pollution Reduction Grant (CPRG) from the EPA, which they applied for in 2023. The Village hopes the to become less reliant on other fuel like diesel or wood, as well as train members to be able to install and maintain solar arrays.

“In our region specifically, we are so reliant on fuel to provide any electricity demand meeting our heating loads,” said Deilah Johnson, tribal resources director for the Village of Solomon. “So most homes, actually, I would say probably 90% of the homes within the entire Bering Strait region, which is 20 communities, have a wood stove as backup.”

The program is part of a larger regional environmental plan. That plan includes a number of different goals in regards to energy, pollution reduction and solid waste, and the Village has partnered Michigan State University, UAF and others to pursue them.

Johnson said their Village has been working on renewable energy sources since 2016, because as recently as 2010, they were fully reliant on diesel.

In 2021, Johnson and other tribal members installed an array of 21 solar panels. That array has already decreased fuel costs, and even on a cloudy day, of which Nome has many, Johnson says the array generates 30% of the electricity for the building.

“I think if we are able to meet on demand with renewable energy sources, that’s going to make a huge difference on the resiliency,” Johnson said. “And then it’s offsetting such high cost for fuel because fuel is so expensive.”

The goal is to reduce the percentage of households in the Bering strait region that rely on barrels of diesel fuel by 40% by 2040, according to Johnson.

However, Johnson says there have been setbacks and delays with that goal.

Recently, Johnson became concerned about the status of their grant after funding freezes impacted the EPA.

For about a month, Johnson said she was unable to get in touch with her program officer at the EPA due to a communication hold.

“She wasn’t allowed to communicate with me, and that was very alarming,” Johnson said. “Because I had already worked with her for two years, and even on her PTO days and she’s on vacation, she still emails.”

Ultimately, Johnson did hear back from her, and regained access to the funds, but said she is still nervous about the stability of those funds.

“Even though word was that we can spend the money, there’s still that insecurity and trusting whether or not they will contact me and say I need to pay back the money because it’s not aligning with the administration’s priorities.”

Which is why Johnson visited with the Alaska congressional delegation in Washington D.C. as well as representatives within the Department of Energy, who is also a funding partner of the Village.

One of the DOE employees that Johnson met with used the term “wasteful projects” to describe the solar arrays and other projects like it. Johnson said she hoped to better communicate with them the importance they hold for her community.

“He does not have experience within Alaska, let alone remote Alaska,” Johnson said. “The reliability of the energy insecurities that we face and the background of making these projects feasible, realistic. I mean, there’s so much that goes into that just alone before this administration. So I was trying to reiterate how important it is for us to maintain a good relationship and communicating the honesty. And then I asked him specifically how can I support you in understanding the need and how important these projects are to rural Alaska.”

That was not the first time Johnson has received opposition to renewable projects in the region.

“I’m constantly getting pushback from people within the construction industry,” Johnson said “And I think that for one it’s frustrating because I think what they’re assuming is that I’m going to be fully reliant on it and that’s not my intent whatsoever. My intent is to offset any amount of diesel that I can.”

For families that rely on diesel, Johnson said that offset can make quite the difference.

“I think that it’s reassuring households that they are going to live a little bit more of a quality lifestyle, not having to spend $800 a month on heating fuel,” Johnson said.

As well as an added redundancy in the event of blackouts and storms in a region known for them, similar to the 2022 Typhoon Merbok that hit the region.

“Having more of our own local source to meet our loads in our households or our public facilities creates a resiliency factor based on blackouts and big storms,” Johnson said.

Ultimately, Johnson said the program and the grant are not just working towards installing the arrays, but training tribal members in the skills needed to do so, as well as the skills to maintain them.

“It’s integral to have people trained during the install,” Johnson said, “because they’re going to have 1) A sense of ownership, 2) A sense of understanding on how it’s operating and how it’s functioning, and then 3) We don’t want to have to fly somebody in from New York to help us maintain, and so we’re really excited to have people on the ground learning about the system and understanding the way that it’s working.”

In the end, Johnson and others are working to get their community, and the rest of Alaska, “up to speed.”

“For the longest time in these rural communities, we were on honey buckets,” Johnson said. “And so as we were continuing development to create affordable housing and just kind of getting up to speed with the rest of the world in our infrastructure and resiliency, I think that it’s integral for the survival of these communities to really kind of grow and to maintain, while protecting their citizens lifestyles, because that’s really their cultural thriving identity.”

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