Alyeschem Breaks Ground on North Slope Petrochemical Factory
Alyeschem CEO J.R. Wilcox and other project partners sign the foundational pile driven at the groundbreaking ceremony on May 15, 2026.
Photo Credit: Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority
Alyeschem broke ground at the site of a North Slope factory that will manufacture value-added chemicals and fuel products. Located in Prudhoe Bay on a gravel pad previously laid down by the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority (AIDEA), the facility will convert natural gas and carbon dioxide into methanol and hydrogen, and the hydrogen is used to refine ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel.
It would be the first petrochemical plant in the US Arctic.
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By producing ultra-low sulfur diesel locally, Alysechem aims to reduce the emissions of industrial activity on the North Slope. The plant will also serve as a launchpad for future clean fuel and chemical production, including dimethyl ether and enhanced oil recovery chemicals.
“What we’re doing with Alyeschem is creating a plant to make methanol and to desulfurize diesel. This is something that almost every chemical engineer who’s gone through the North Slope for the last forty years has known that would be useful,” says Alyeschem COO Craig Graff.
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May 2026
A fabrication plant in Texas is building truckable modules that will be assembled at the site, after Alyeschem has completed the preparation of pile driving and building a tank farm.
The facility is expected to come online in late 2027 and support approximately fifteen operations jobs.
In May 2024, the AIDEA board authorized up to $70 million in financing to advance construction and long-term operation while leveraging substantial private-sector investment, or about half of the $140 million price tag. The other half of the project is financed by BP Energy Partners and McKinley Alaska Private Investment.
“It was excellent to work with AIDEA and have a lender that could be creative like that and do something outside the box that the banks just aren’t willing to do,” says Logan Birch, vice president of direct lending at McKinley Alaska Private Investment and president of its sister company Alaska Growth Capital.
At the Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference on May 21, 2026, Alyeschem CEO J.R. Wilcox presented a depiction of the completed petrochemical factory. The subscript “3” in the Alyeschem logo refers to part of the formula for methanol, also called wood alcohol.
Photo Credit: Office of the Governor
“AIDEA’s role is economic development and job creation within the state,” says AIDEA’s Chief Investment Officer Geoff Johns, “and we felt that this project did just that in the form of creating value add for the oil and gas industry here, as well as substituting imported methanol from out of country and producing it here at home.”
Alyeschem CEO J.R. Wilcox adds, “We’re going to wind up with being able to start seeing the state be more self-reliant in its own critical commodities and better use its natural resources because we have that kind of a long-term investor.”
Days after the groundbreaking, Wilcox was in Anchorage for the Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference. Wilcox, an environmental chemist who co-founded Cook Inlet Energy in 2009 and started Alyeschem in 2015, told attendees, “We actually have steel going in the ground now. This took about eleven years from the point when I was, ‘Oh, this would be a neat idea,’ to the point where we’re actually getting to make it happen.”
Wilcox added, “The North Slope of Alaska is a truly unique geological opportunity. If 200 years from now we’re not burning fossil fuels anymore, we’re probably going to be doing something else with them. The North Slope is not going away.”
Alysechem anticipates reducing the carbon dioxide emissions of North Slope operators by 93 percent—approximately 45,000 tons per year—compared to current supply methods. The facility will likely also eliminate an estimated 4,000 truck trips annually, reducing road wear and emissions across the region.
