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15 Years ago in the Sounder - Murkowski proposes extending railroad to Arctic

December 3rd 6:35 pm | Sounder Staff Print this article   Email this article   Create a Shortlink for this article

November 28, 1996

The remote Northwest corner of Alaska may become a little less hard to reach if U.S. Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, has his way.

According to a press release, Murkowski told those attending the Alaska Miners Association in Anchorage Nov. 6 that preliminary reviews show that it may be economically feasible to extend the Alaska Railroad to Northwest Alaska in order to freight out shipment from major coal and hard rock mineral deposits.

In Murkowski's speech before the mining conference, the chairman of the Senate's Energy and Natural Resource Committee pushed a proposal that would open a major smelter to process ore from the untapped Ambler mining district.

"This project won't be easy," Murkowski said. "But to all who say this project is too big or too difficult to do, I say nothing comes easy. This can be done right and we will do it right."

Murkowski first pitched the extended-railroad idea in June, when he suggested that the Alaska Railroad run a line from Nenana to the Point Lay coal fields in order to open the major coal development, one of the largest untapped-coal mines in the world. The railroad would pas the Ambler mining district, which would enable hard rock deposits to be shipped too.

If such a train line was available to Northwest Alaska, officials at Cominco Alaska would be interested to see if a spur could be added to help ship zinc and lead from Red Dog Mine.

One outgrowth of the mineral development would be the building of a major smelter in Alaska. This smelter could either use power from the Tyee hydroelectric project near Wrangell, or it could use power from the Makushin geothermal (hot springs) project in Unalaska. Either site would offer access to plentiful, low-cost power at tidewater to make it easier to ship the ore within the Pacific Rim.

Murkowski said that preliminary reviews by the Congressional Research Service indicates the mineral deposits in Northwest Alaska, including the coal deposits, would make financing a railroad extension economically viable.

"Northwest Alaska is recognized as the home of the world's largest low-sulfur bituminous coal deposit," Murkowski said. "The North Slope has up to 4 trillion tons of coal of less than one-quarter percent sulfur, with less than 4 percent moisture-coal that averages 12,300 BTU's in heat content. That is a tremendous resource."

The Ambler mining district is home to hard rock deposits of eight identified minerals - zinc, lead, copper, nickel, chromium, tin, barite, gold and silver - all in quantities comparable to the current 800,000-ton annual production of the Red Dog Mine.

A preliminary estimate by engineering firm CH2M Hill gives the project a cost of $4.2 billion to lay 744 miles of railroad track, Murkowski said. Even at that high cost, it would still be feasible and profitable to develop both the railroad and the mines, provided both hard rock and coal deposits can be developed within similar time frames.

Murkowski said such mineral deposits would clearly improve chances for a hard rock smelter to be built in the state to promote valuable added processing. Red Dog is currently producing between 800,000 and 1.2 million tons of ore concentrate a year. Greens Creek mine in Southeast generates about 150,000 tons of ore a year.

A railroad tie to the Northwest portion of the state would help with normal shipping of groceries and other products that currently are only shipped by barge. The railroad wouldn't be as constrained by river and sea ice as the barges, which can only be used for shipping during the ice-free seasons, making shipping easier and cheaper for local residents.

 

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