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Lawmakers propose Energy Department Bill would re-align several Alaska government agencies, programs into one department with hope of streamlining energy planning Eric Lidji Petroleum News
State lawmakers have proposed legislation to create a Department of Energy.
The bill introduced April 6 would bring two public corporations into a single department with the aim of increasing coordination. The new Department of Energy would oversee the Alaska Energy Authority and the Alaska Natural Gas Development Authority.
ANGDA is currently under the Department of Revenue, while AEA is under the Department of Commerce, Community and Economic Development. The Department of Energy would handle home weatherization and in-state gas pipeline issues, but would not cover the resource management issues handled by the Department of Natural Resources.
The bill follows a three-and-a-half-hour roundtable on April 4, where representatives from energy groups across the state met with members of the House Special Committee on Energy to discuss how the state can better govern policy related to energy issues.
“The importance of our approach is that it reorganizes state government and we are committed to ensuring a coordinated, streamlined department,” Charisse Millett, an Anchorage Republican and co-chair of the House Energy Committee said in a statement. “It simply transfers current programs and agencies over to the energy department so they work more efficiently and deliver better service to urban and rural regions of the state.”
Gov. Sarah Palin said in a statement that she supported the idea to a point.
“I share the intent of committee members to streamline and consolidate the state’s energy programs, but with an expectation that efficiencies must be delivered. Alaskans are counting on us to keep the growth of government in check. This legislation must have a positive or at least a neutral fiscal note,” Palin said.
Fractured policymaking Many seated at the roundtable said Alaska is currently too fractured on energy policy.
There are at least 15 different groups around the state working on energy plans for Alaska, according to Marilyn Leland, executive director of the Alaska Power Association, a trade group representing most of the electric utilities in the state.
Leland said APA has been advocating for a cabinet-level energy department. She said the current funding system promotes competition rather than cooperation by forcing utilities and local governments to come to the Legislature and individually ask for money.
“We’ve got to be looking at the state as a whole,” she said.
An energy department isn’t the only solution, according to John Davies, with the Cold Climate Housing Research Center, a research and testing group in Fairbanks.
Davies suggested a cabinet level task force that would unite state agencies, lawmakers, local communities and the private sector toward crafting and implementing goals.
“In my view, that’s the only way that we can have the coordination that we need,” Davies said.
Millet said the idea behind a new department would be to allow for “restructuring and realignment of government, but with authority,” as opposed to a task force that could make recommendations, but wouldn’t have the power to act on those recommendations.
Many present at the roundtable expressed concern that AEA didn’t currently have enough resources to fulfill its ever-growing mission. Over the course of last year, the agency went from a relatively small agency to managing $100 million in renewable energy grants and taking an inventory of the energy possibilities in every community in the state.
“We partner a lot with AEA and I’ll just put on the table that in my view, I think they’re under-resourced for the task they have,” said George Cannelos, federal co-chairman of the Denali Commission.
New plans for the interim Both the House and Senate Special Committees on Energy have been working this session toward creating an energy policy and plan for Alaska, hearing from energy experts and taking two trips into rural Alaska to take testimony from residents there.
During the upcoming interim time between sessions, Millet said the House Energy Committee would hold “policy summits” around the state. She said the committee plans to take existing energy policies crafted on a local level and use them to build the framework for a statewide energy policy, which would be introduced next session.
The work involves traveling to nine communities around the state.
“So we have some pretty hefty goals in mind for interim,” Millet said.
The work runs concurrently — and many hope cooperatively — with ongoing efforts from the Alaska Energy Authority, charged by Palin to create an energy plan for the state.
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