When the environment’s protectors ally themselves with its looters, it falls to local people and local institutions to defend the waters and ecosystems on which we depend. With the Trump administration’s Environmental Protection Agency bowing to fossil fuel interests, Cook Inlet | Tikahtnu is on the chopping block. This is our home, not a sacrifice zone.
Tikahtnu is not a dumping ground for industry. Oil and gas corporations are raking in private profits while turning our public waters into sewers, and the Big Beautiful Bill hands them the keys to pollute even more. Hilcorp, the region’s largest oil and gas operator, continues to treat it as one, despite raking in record profits in 2024. All while paying zero state income tax.
Unlike every other region in the U.S., platforms in the Inlet are not required to recycle their wastewater. Instead, they rely on “mixing zones,” which are loopholes that allow them to discharge toxic production waste, laced with heavy metals, pretending tides and currents dilute it. This outdated “dilution is the solution to pollution” mentality subverts the Clean Water Act and turns our public waters into private sewers. Billions of gallons of toxic waste pour into the Inlet each year, poisoning beluga whale habitat and fish that Alaskans depend on for their food and livelihood.
Upper Cook Inlet already bears the scars of decades of fossil fuel extraction, but the next wave of projects threatens to push fragile ecosystems to the brink of collapse. The proposed AK LNG project would pipe North Slope gas to Nikiski for export, cutting under Tikahtnu with subsea trenching and pile driving just 17 miles from the Susitna Delta, a vital summer feeding ground for nearly the entire population of endangered Cook Inlet belugas. On the eastern shore, the gas would feed a liquefaction plant and export terminal, adding LNG tankers and shipping traffic to waters already noisy enough to exceed beluga harassment thresholds on a near-daily basis. If completed, AK LNG could increase vessel traffic in Tikahtnu by 42–75%, further threatening these whales and the communities connected to them.
What lessons learned from protecting Lower Cook Inlet should we pass on to our children? Lower Cook Inlet has so far been spared from the industrialization seen further north. In 1976, Alaskan outcry pressured the AK Legislature to buy back oil and gas leases in Kachemak Bay, setting a precedent for protecting local waters. Thanks to persistent opposition and shaky industry economics, the region has remained platform-free for almost 50 years, fueling a thriving tourism economy that generates millions of dollars annually for Southcentral Alaska.
Today, relentless lobbying has paid off for the fossil fuel industry. Not only is Lease Sale 258 moving forward without public comment, but the Big Beautiful Bill mandates lease sales in Lower Cook Inlet waters in 2026, 2027, 2028, 2030, 2031, and 2032. Previously excluded critical beluga habitat zones are now available for leasing, stripping away the few remaining safeguards. Oil & gas from Lower Cook Inlet would take years to develop, far too late to address any short-term energy concerns. The truth is simple: drilling more gas here is not a solution. It is a false narrative that jeopardizes our future, all for fleeting profit.
Every oil spill begins with a lease sale. Every rig, every tanker, every trench brings us closer to the day Tikahtnu is transformed from a vibrant, life-sustaining watershed into an industrial sacrifice zone. But this fight is not over. We have stopped ill-conceived projects before, and with your voice and action, we can do it again! Join Inletkeeper in saying no to the industrialization of our watershed and yes to a thriving, sustainable future for Tikahtnu.