BLM studies Alaska’s slice of ring of fire for resource potential

Petroleum News Anchorage staff

What stretches some 2,500 miles along the southern edge of Alaska, from Attu Island at the western end of the Aleutian Islands to the Canadian border in Southeast Alaska? It's Alaska’s share of what is called the ring of fire, a zone of frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, and an area the U.S. Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management is beginning to study for a resource management plan and environmental impact statement.

Alaska’s ring of fire zone, where the agency manages approximately 1.3 million acres of public land, includes the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, the Municipality of Anchorage, the Kenai Peninsula Borough, Kodiak Island, portions of the Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands.

The agency says a resource management plan is required before it can take specific resource management actions such as opening or closing areas to oil and gas leasing or making area of critical environmental concern or visual resource management class designations.

Bob Lloyd, ring of fire project manager, told Petroleum News that Congress appropriated money in the 2000 budget for land plans in Alaska and other states. The driving force here, he said, is that there hasn't been a bureau plan that covers this area, where the agency manages lands which vary in size from small scattered tracts to some hundred-thousand-acre tracts.

BLM's planning process begins with a scoping process, with comments taken until July 1. Lloyd said the bureau plans to have a draft EIS ready for public comment in early 2005, and a decision and final EIS by the end of that year.

Scheduled scoping meetings include: Juneau April 28, Centennial Hall; Skagway April 29, National Park Service Visitor Center; Haines April 30, Haines Borough Public Library; Palmer May 5, Colony High School; Kenai May 8, Kenai Central High School; Kodiak May 12, Kodiak High School; Anchorage May 13, BLM Anchorage Field Office. The meetings will begin with an informational open house at 6 p.m. including a brief overview of the plan, purpose, objectives and schedule, followed by a question, answer and comment session from approximately 7:20 to 9 p.m.