20th Century Comes at Last to Alaska Hamlet

This tiny community saw its population dwindle because some people just couldn’t stand living with only lanterns, candles and small generators.

All that changed over the weekend when a switch was flipped in the village’s new power plant, and electricity flowed through a buried cable. Over the next few weeks, the juice will make its way to the 15 homes that make up this town 180 miles west of Anchorage.

Lime Village, population 50, is one of the last communities in Alaska to get electricity. A couple of other tiny settlements in southeastern Alaska are still waiting.

“This wasn’t just plopped down on us. It came from this community. Almost everybody worked on it,” said Phil Graham, a teacher in Lime Village for 20 years.

The power plant is an experimental system powered by diesel and solar energy. If it works, it could be duplicated in other rural Alaska communities and help reduce utility costs, said Percy Frisby, director of the state Division of Energy.

State Sen. Georgianna Lincoln predicted that the population of Lime Village will soon double. “There are family members who want to move back but who did not want to go on using a candle and kerosene lamp,” she said.

Residents of Lime Village first started talking about getting electricity 15 years ago. For the last few years, the village has been saving its share of money allocated by the Legislature for community capital projects.

It’s hard to get fuel into Lime Village, hence the price is high. The Stony River, which wraps around the village, is too shallow for barges. And the airstrip is too short for big transport planes.

So gasoline and diesel are delivered in 300-gallon lots. Gas costs about $4 a gallon and diesel about $3 a gallon, so residents limit running their generators to just a few hours every night. Those few hours a night can add up to about $100 a month, Graham said.

Residents rely on wood for heat and usually don’t fire up the generators on winter mornings because they are hard to start in the cold and dark.

The new plant cost $530,000. It was developed by a Vermont company using $227,000 in grants from the federal government and the Alaska Science and Technology Foundation. The community kicked in $150,000 and the energy division another $150,000.

Underground wires were laid to each house before the ground froze last fall. A transfer switch was installed at each house, which will allow residents to switch back to their personal generators if there is a power failure. Each house has a meter too. But nobody knows yet what to expect in electric bills.

“It will probably be cheaper, but it will still be very expensive,” Graham said. “And compared to Anchorage, it will be out of sight. It’s nice to have power, but everyone’s going to be shocked when they get their first bills.”