inletkeeper

Protecting Alaska's Cook Inlet watershed and the life it sustains since 1995.

Local Economies

Oil & Gas Lease Sale 258 is a False Solution to High Gas Prices and Sacrifices Cook Inlet Communities

By | September 22, 2022

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: September 22, 2022 FOR MORE INFORMATION: Sue Mauger, 907.399.2070, sue@inletkeeper.org Taylor Kendal Smith, 907.802.0534, taylor@inletkeeper.org Ben Boettger, 603.306.1352, ben@inletkeeper.org HOMER, Alaska — Today, the Department of the Interior released the Proposed Notice of Sale for Lease Sale 258 in Cook Inlet, Alaska. This is in direct response to the passing of the […]

The road to energy security isn’t through Cook Inlet

By | September 16, 2022

80% of Southcentral Alaska’s electricity is generated by natural gas turbines, and about a third of our electric bills go to fueling them. All this gas is extracted from beneath or around Cook Inlet, and for decades this local market has grown increasingly precarious. This April, the near-monopoly supplier of gas to our utilities, Hilcorp, […]

In Pursuit of a Better Alaska Food System for All

By | September 5, 2022

My childhood was filled with happy meals and the cool toys that came with them, an occasional McRiblet sandwich, and hours on the golden arches’ playgrounds before and after school. My father put in 47 years working in Georgia for McDonald’s.  Although my experiences from a lifelong relationship with the restaurant chain are directly influenced […]

Act Now for Cook Inlet’s Future Beyond Oil & Gas

By | August 31, 2022

Since our last update, the Inflation Reduction Act passed, bringing with it a mandate to hold Lease Sale 258 in the federal waters of Lower Cook Inlet before the end of 2022. Although we can’t stop this unpopular sale from moving forward, Inletkeeper and partners will be monitoring the level of industry interest to push […]

White Noise and Our Vision for Cook Inlet

By | August 3, 2022

Cook Inletkeeper has been fighting alongside our supporters for our collective vision of Cook Inlet for the last 27 years. This vision has focused on clean water, healthy salmon, and strong communities. One central theme of this fight has been limiting oil and gas development and corresponding pollution.  That vision is still central today. Inletkeeper’s […]

PROPOSED BILL IN CONGRESS IGNORES ALASKANS, WOULD SACRIFICE COOK INLET

By | July 28, 2022

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 28, 2022 FOR MORE INFORMATION: Liz Mering, Inletkeeper (907.235.3459)  Marissa Wilson, Executive Director AMCC (907.299.6566)  PROPOSED BILL IN CONGRESS IGNORES ALASKANS, WOULD SACRIFICE COOK INLET 40 years of oil and gas development in undeveloped Lower Cook Inlet puts local economies at risk HOMER, AK – The proposed climate and energy package […]

Defend Your Vision for Cook Inlet

By | July 9, 2022

If you are like me, you feel like we just celebrated Lease Sale 258 in Lower Cook Inlet being taken off the table. Unfortunately, as many of you are only too familiar with, we are again facing a proposed lease sale in Lower Cook Inlet.  President Biden and the Department of Interior proposed a five-year plan […]

Go Mine the Dump Instead of Baby Salmon Nurseries in Bristol Bay

By | June 23, 2022

How many times do we have to say NO to a bad project that would harm Alaskans? Most Alaskans know the main storyline of the decades-long Pebble Mine saga: Geologists discover the pebble deposit in 1987; A series of foreign companies thought it would be easy to dig a giant pit and mine the headwaters […]

Push Back Against Pebble Mine, One Last Time

By | June 16, 2022

On Monday, I saw a helicopter pilot I hadn’t seen in 14 years. Stan piloted my first trip in Bristol Bay to sample small headwater streams near the Pebble deposit. Seeing Stan brought up a flood of memories and names of people who have contributed to the decades of work to protect Bristol Bay, each […]

Visualizing a Just Transition

By | June 6, 2022

Over the three-day Nughelnik: Alaska Just Transition Summit in Anchorage May 20-22, Inletkeeper staff joined 500 other attendees from around the State of Alaska. Organized by The Alaska Just Transition Collective – a coalition of Alaska partners building a shared visionary path for Alaska by addressing the growing political, economic, and ecological crises we face. The goals […]

Regenerative Economies: Cornerstones for a Just Transition

By | June 2, 2022

“It’s time to find our way back to what our ancestors had. Our people come from just economies, and we need to bring everyone with us, especially those most intent on destroying the Earth because we can’t afford that anymore”  – Karlin Itchoak, Alaska State Director at the Wilderness Society This past May, many of […]

Defend the Bear Coast from Pebble Mine

By |

Alaska’s bears and salmon are inextricably linked. During the summer months, while Alaskans are filling our freezers with salmon, the brown bears on the Alaska Peninsula are storing up their salmon for the winter. Bears of the Alaska Peninsula are incredible — eating dozens of salmon and gaining up to 4 pounds a day. The […]

Living as Conservation Medicine Experts in Alaska

By | June 1, 2022

By Kayla Walsh, Alaska Conservation Foundation Intern What brings a city girl like me to Cook Inlet, a place I hadn’t heard of just 6 months ago? Well, I started a graduate program in Conservation Medicine and I’m here to learn all about it from the real experts: Alaskans! I’ve been asked what Conservation Medicine […]

Meaningful Community Action: Let’s Get to Work!

By | May 18, 2022

Working together, Alaskans are a powerful force for positive change in our communities. Let’s roll up our sleeves and put local solutions into action! We’ve all seen what happens when outsiders come in and do things without meaningful input from locals: We get cookie cutter houses built for Florida winters where all the roofs shed […]

Oil & Gas Lease Sale 258 in Lower Cook Inlet Canceled

By | May 13, 2022

Late on Wednesday the Biden Administration quietly announced that the Department of Interior would not be pursuing Oil & Gas Lease Sale 258 in Lower Cook Inlet.  First, we are thankful! Alaskans have been fighting the industrialization of Cook Inlet since the 90s and each of these victories is important for our communities that rely […]

Energy Democracy in Alaska

By | May 2, 2022

An abbreviated version of this piece was initially published in our Spring 2022 newsletter. When America began to electrify, lights came on first in cities. It made commercial sense: the city’s affluent could easily foot the cost of power, and urban density meant less line to lay and easier maintenance. Electricity beyond the city made […]

Electronic Recycling: Inletkeeper’s Annual Game of Tetris

By | April 28, 2022

After a short winter lull, Inletkeeper’s programs start revving up come spring. One program that Kenai Peninsula residents have grown to count on are our annual spring electronics recycling events. This year is no different. Mark your calendars for April 30th for our annual e-recycling events in Soldotna and Homer. Drop off your old devices […]

Elevating Local Knowledge to Protect Our Salmon

By | April 5, 2022

Salmon and agriculture are two of Alaska’s most important renewable resources. Alaska’s agricultural sectors are growing faster than any other state in the nation. With the formation of both the Alaska Grown Caucus in the Alaska Legislature and the announcement by the Governor of the Food Security & Independence Task Force, farming is poised to […]

Say No to 404 Permitting in the State Budget!

By | April 3, 2022

This year will mark 50 years since Congress passed and enacted the Clean Water Act (CWA) after our nation’s rivers literally caught fire. This disregard of pollution was not unique to the Lower 48 as Alaska fishermen were finding blobs of oil floating in the ocean from passing tankers. While the Clean Water Act isn’t […]

This is YOUR Future

By | December 23, 2021

You look at seed catalogs in December. You buy snow blowers in June. You mend nets in August. You prepare for your future guided by your hopes for the future.  So let’s all brush aside the fog of uncertainty clouding our vision over these last 18 months and prepare for the future we want in […]

The Future of Food: Prioritizing Local and Sustainable

By | December 21, 2021

The past 18 months have illuminated the tremendous unsustainable practices and social inequities throughout many sectors, including our globalized food system. We have seen food processors fall ill from lack of sick leave and protective equipment. Severely delayed global supply chains have led to massive food waste and higher food costs. Lost incomes have exacerbated […]

Energy for the future is here now

By | December 20, 2021

The climate damage of fossil fuels has been widely known since at least the 1980s, and as an Inletkeeper, you don’t need reminding how hazardous its infrastructure is for our watershed. Still, in the past it’s been creditable to say that with cheap, abundant natural gas, and with renewable energy technologies just not ready to […]

A Vision for Cook Inlet’s Next 25 Years

By | December 15, 2021

I am incredibly honored by Bob, Sue, and of your trust as I step into the role Bob has, seemingly effortlessly, managed for so many years. As I inherit the “Inletkeeper” title from Bob, I’d like to share my vision for the future of the Cook Inlet watershed in the decades ahead: Alaska’s economy has […]

Create the World You Wish to Inhabit

By | December 9, 2021

Lease ART Sale 258 Update: Thank you all for a successful Art Sale 258 and Draft Environmental Impact Statement comment period! We are able to do this work because of member support from concerned citizens like you. Please donate today to protect Cook Inlet for our future generations. In the world we wish to inhabit, there is no […]

ART (NOT Lease) Sale 258

By | December 3, 2021

Friday, 3 December 2021: For Immediate Release Soldotna, AK: Five local artists from the Cook Inlet basin have come together to raise awareness about the federal government’s Lease Sale 258, which would open up over a million acres of Lower Cook Inlet to oil and gas development. The area, from below Kalgin Island down to […]

Protect our Bear Coast – Say No to Oil Spills

By | December 2, 2021

Fat Bear Week brings the wonder and joy of our Cook Inlet bears to people around the world!  This year–for the fourth time!!–Otis (or brown bear 480) was crowned king!  Otis–relying on the amazing rich nutrients in Katmai–ended the season weighing over 1,000 pounds. Not the largest bear of the bunch but a survivor! Otis […]

Growing Sustainable Roots for Alaska’s Farmers Markets, Farm Stands, and CSAs

By | December 1, 2021

December 1, 2021 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Alaska Farmers Market Association awarded a USDA Grant to support farmers markets, farm stands, and Community Support Agriculture Homer, AK- The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has awarded $37.5 Million this year to 84 recipients across the country, including funding to Alaska’s Cook Inletkeeper, fiscal sponsor, and incubator […]

Playing Russian Roulette with Lower Cook Inlet

By | November 15, 2021

Over the last fifty years, U.S. waters  have been affected by almost 50 oil spills over 420,000 gallons.  A few of the most famous are:  Santa Barbara, California (1969): 3 million  gallons spilled from an offshore platform blowout creating a 35 mile long oil slick.  Exxon Valdez, Alaska (1989): 10.8 million gallons spilled from a […]

Make Your Voice Heard for the Inlet!

By | November 10, 2021

Last week we asked you – our Inletkeepers – to stand up for Lower Cook Inlet and say “no” to the proposed oil and gas lease sale in Lower Cook Inlet. If you haven’t already signed the petition, please do so at inletkeeper.org/ls258 – and then share with 5 friends (or five more friends!)! Many […]

Trading Food Security, Fisheries, and Local Economies for Temporary Gains: Oppose Lease Sale 258

By | November 2, 2021

Central to most Alaskan’s plates are salmon and other foods from the sea. It’s hard to visit Kachemak Bay without also enjoying fresh oysters or beer-battered fish. Halibut and salmon are common freezer staples all year long. It’s hard to imagine Alaska without this plentiful bounty. Given our high food costs, many Alaskan families supplement […]

You are Inletkeeper and Cook Inlet Needs You!

By | November 1, 2021

You are Inletkeeper – and NOW is a critical time to stand up for Cook Inlet. Last Friday, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) released the draft Environmental Impact Statement for the proposed oil and gas lease sale in Lower Cook Inlet. We now have 45 days to explain to our government why this […]

Organic Matter Matters

By | October 6, 2021

Through the Central Kenai Peninsula’s Community Compost project, we’ve learned just how much organic matter matters in our watershed. At number three out of the top 100 solutions to reverse global warming (drawdown.org), reducing food waste will take a huge bite out of methane emissions, something cold-water fish like our beloved salmon will appreciate. A […]

Tracking Your Carbon Foodprint

By | September 29, 2021

At the last Harvest Moon Festival in Soldotna, our Local Foods Program hosted a booth, with an interactive component aimed at helping event participants understand the carbon footprint of their food choices. The carbon footprint of a food, or “foodprint,” is the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions produced throughout its journey from seed to farm, processing […]

Bringing Solar Full Circle

By | September 22, 2021

As we transition from long summer nights to fall, the autumnal equinox reminds us that Solarize the Kenai is nearing the end of its 2021 season. Inletkeeper proudly supports this volunteer-led effort to help make clean energy more affordable to Kenai Peninsula residents. In 2020, 84 people added photovoltaic (PV) rooftop panels to their homes […]

Inletkeeper Joins Suit to Stop Dunleavy from Fouling Cook Inlet

By | April 27, 2021

When President Biden took office, he promptly delivered on his campaign promise to address climate change by pausing new oil and gas leasing in federal waters until his Administration could review the leasing program. The pause put the brakes on proposed federal Lease Sale 258, which had been rushed through in a matter of months […]

Living, Working, & Farming in a Salmon Landscape: Embracing an Alaskan Land Ethic

By | April 9, 2021

Conservationist and ecologist Aldo Leopold published his pivotal essay Land Ethic in 1949. Central to this essay is a call for honoring our moral responsibility to the natural world, by caring not only about ourselves, but also the land, and the inseparable relationships between them. Land Ethic demands thinking and action beyond our own immediate […]

New Report Shows Mining Not Alaska’s Next Golden Goose

By | April 6, 2021

As Alaska girds for a future without the wave of petrodollars that fueled our early years, it’s time we decide how best to protect and develop the incredible natural resources that make the Great Land unique. A new report makes clear that hard rock mining will not fill the fiscal gap left by flagging oil […]

Inletkeeper Applauds Halt to Cook Inlet Oil & Gas Lease Sale Process

By | February 4, 2021

Cook Inletkeeper today applauded the decision by the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) to cancel public hearings around the proposed million-acre Oil & Gas Lease Sale 258 in Lower Cook Inlet.  BOEM’s move comes in the wake of President Biden’s January 27 Executive Order placing a pause on all oil and gas leasing […]

Trump Throws Lifeline to Big Oil With Last-Second Inlet Lease Sale

By | January 13, 2021

In the last brutal days of the Trump Administration, the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) threw a desperate lifeline to the oil and gas industry. On January 13, BOEM released a rushed and haphazard draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to pave the way for a million-acre oil and gas lease sale in the […]

Imagining the Future We Want into Being

By | January 1, 2021

What is the common thread between Concord, NH; Denton, TX; Norman, OK and a growing number of American cities? They all have a commitment to 100% clean energy within the next 30 years. The transition from fossil fuels to renewables is inevitable. What’s not inevitable is that this transition is just and, in the words […]

Dunleavy Chooses Oil Over Salmon in Cook Inlet

By | December 10, 2020

This past week, the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council sent shockwaves across Alaska when it abruptly closed commercial salmon fishing in the federal waters of Lower Cook Inlet. The closure resulted from the State of Alaska’s blanket refusal to work with the federal government to co-manage the salmon fishery in Lower Cook Inlet. The irony […]

People, Planet and Profits: Pillars for Building Sustainable & Equitable Food Systems

By | December 8, 2020

Food systems, like all systems, are made up of interconnected links, with change in one link inevitably affecting others. Links include all aspects of the food system, from farmers to processors, to retail and transportation. Our modern food system is focused on feeding an ever-growing world population, as efficiently and economically as possible, but often […]

Is the Pebble Mine Dead?

By | November 25, 2020

On the day before Thanksgiving, Alaskans woke to astounding news: the Army Corps rejected a major permit for the Pebble mine. Never before had the Army Corps rejected a major permit for a large oil, gas or mining project in Alaska. Never. And it only came about after years and years of relentless pressure from […]

PEBBLE MINE IS A GIANT BLACK EYE FOR ALASKA

By | November 18, 2020

When I was young and my mom thought I was running with the wrong crowd, she had a simple admonition: if you lay down in the gutter, you get up dirty. That was long ago. But today, when I look at our industry “partners” in Alaska, it feels like we’re wallowing in the gutter. While […]

The Federal Government Wants to Industrialize Lower Cook Inlet

By | October 8, 2020

Forty-five years ago a group of Alaskans with a passion for Cook Inlet took on the oil and gas industry. And in a remarkable David and Goliath battle, they prevailed. Thanks to this small but dogged group of fishermen, scientists, artists and activists, the epic view across Kachemak Bay – and the remarkable resources of […]

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