A New Ballgame for Port MacKenzie

Another recent user, Griffin says, is Cook Inlet Region, Inc. The Alaska Native corporation owns and operates the wind turbines on Fire Island and occasionally needs a staging area where turbine equipment can be laid out and then carried by barge. Although the Port of Alaska in Anchorage is closer (10 miles instead of 10.5), it’s also frequently busy, so the turbine equipment had been frequently shipped to Homer or Seward, then brought to Fire Island by barge. After realizing the proximity of Port MacKenzie to Fire Island and learning that Port MacKenzie offers low tariff rates for companies, in addition to having plenty of room for staging cargo, Griffin says Cook Inlet Region, Inc. has become a regular user.

The 720-foot M/V Sheila Anne, the largest ship to dock at Port MacKenzie, offloads 66,000 tons of salt from Mexico in April for use on roads throughout the state.

A Graying Workforce

In both Alaska and the Lower 48, the trucking industry is seeing an aging workforce. According to the Commercial Carrier Journal, a trade publication, almost 60 percent of the national driver workforce is older than 45.

Nationally, a dearth of young drivers is sometimes blamed for what some see as a pending existential crisis in the driving industry. Under this theory, young people are avoiding the trucking industry out of concern that self-driving cars and trucks will make the jobs obsolete in their lifetimes.

Crum says autonomous trucks will eventually make their way to way to Alaska highways. But he argues that’s not a reason for young people to avoid the industry. Automation, he says, will assist drivers, not replace them.

“Some of those vehicles are the wave of the future. It’s going to happen,” he says. “The response to this from both the American and Alaskan trucking associations is the same and that is: planes are almost fully automated. But when is the last time you got on a plane that didn’t have a pilot?”

In the Lower 48, the work schedule of long-haul truckers may also be discouraging some younger people from pursuing truck driving jobs. But that’s less of a factor in Alaska, says Aves Thompson, executive director of the Alaska Trucking Association. Alaska is a big state, but there are few long routes that take employees away from home for weeks, he says. A trucker can go from Anchorage to Prudhoe Bay and back in few days.

Industrial Emphasis

Two miles is all that separates the Mat-Su Borough-owned Port MacKenzie from Anchorage. Hotel Captain Cook, a landmark of the Anchorage skyline easily spotted from across the inlet, is closer to the Port MacKenzie dock (as the raven flies) than it is to Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport. From the Port MacKenzie Terminal building, the city across the inlet looks almost close enough to toss a rock across.

The Port of Alaska is busy, with ships docking twice a week to deliver goods for store shelves, fuel tankers offloading, a few cruise ships each year, military use, and more. The port handled more than 5.5 million tons of freight and fuel in 2025. Handling more than half of the imported goods coming into Alaska, it’s a keystone of the Alaska economy.

But on the edge of downtown Anchorage, the city-owned port is short on space. While 125 acres of cargo-handling space sounds like a sizeable chunk of land, there’s not a lot of laydown space for storing pipe or bulk materials or for processing raw materials, especially with the Port of Alaska now working on a multi-year facility modernization project that includes significant upgrades to the cargo berths used by primary shippers TOTE Maritime and Matson.

Mat-Su Borough officials have long touted the compatibility of the two ports: goods and containerized freight make sense at the Port of Alaska, while raw materials and other industrial needs are better handled at Port MacKenzie. With the current presidential administration’s emphasis on developing Alaska’s natural resources, Griffin says Port MacKenzie is a logical partner in that process.

Located on the west side of Cook Inlet, the port, which celebrates its 26th year of operations this year, boasts 8,000 acres of uplands and 1,000 acres of tidal and submerged lands. It consists of a 1,200-foot deep-water dock, a 375-foot barge dock, and 15 acres of gravel wharf. Also in its favor: the channel is deep on that side of Knik Arm, so it doesn’t require frequent dredging to maintain the depth, which is a constant struggle on the Anchorage side.

“In terms of natural resource development in the Interior, this port is the logical place to bring the industrial type of bulk commodities that the state is in the process of developing, such as ore, coal, and timber. As the state grows and develops, this port is the logical location to move these commodities to market,” Griffin says.

Tracking Progress

The port also has a significant project on the horizon that could boost commodity use: a 32-mile rail extension project from the Alaska Railroad line near Houston south to Port MacKenzie. The rail project began in 2006, branching from a T-shaped intersection just south of Little Susitna River in Houston, but work stalled in 2016 during the state’s economic recession. The right-of-way fades into the woods across the street from the Point MacKenzie Correctional Farm.

Earlier this year, the Alaska Gasline Development Corporation (AGDC) revived the rail extension, integrating the port’s fortunes with the multibillion-dollar energy project. AGDC partnered with two Australian companies in creating Alaska Infrastructure Partners, a public-private partnership aimed at finally completing the project. The Alaska Railroad, DOT&PF, Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority, and the Mat-Su Borough are stakeholders in the project.

Macquarie Capital, a division of Macquarie Group that is focused on financing development and infrastructure projects, and global rail developer Martinus are working toward finishing the predevelopment process, which includes identifying funding for the $275 million to $300 million worth of work remaining. Twenty-five miles of the 32-mile rail bed have been built, and six of seven bridges are in place, but the rail bed needs ballast rock, railroad ties, steel track, and fiber laid along it, along with finishing the last seven miles of the extension and five additional miles of siding and terminal track, adding a communications tower, telecom lines, operational support facilities at the terminal, and a bridge over a roadway. Alaska Industrial Partners hopes to have the project shovel-ready by 2027.

Mat-Su officials have for years touted the port rail extension as a tool that could make mines in the Interior more feasible, providing a way for mining companies to bring their commodities to tidewater, store them on site, and ship them when it makes sense to do so. AGDC sees Port MacKenzie as a place to land 42-inch pipe, equipment, modules, and other construction materials for a North Slope gasline.

The rail extension got a boost in April, when $34 million earmarked for Port MacKenzie was included among Alaska’s $115.4 million share of federal grants from the competitive Port Infrastructure Development Program. The grant will help pay for a 110-acre staging and laydown area, the one-mile rail loop, electric utility expansion, and barge dock improvements.

“This is big news and very exciting for the port,” Griffin says.

Crushing It

One industrial user is already making a home at Port MacKenzie. In March, workers with Australian mining company Nova Minerals were clearing land near the proposed one-mile rail loop on the Port MacKenzie uplands, on a bluff overlooking the port. Griffin says Nova leased 42 acres for a processing site.

Nova, operating as its US subsidiary Alaska Range Resources, is mining the Estelle Project about 90 miles northwest of Anchorage in the Alaska range. Company leaders say the project ranks among the “world’s largest undeveloped gold assets” and offers the potential of near-term antimony production.

Nova is operating a year-round facility at the Estelle site that accommodates eighty people, with a 4,000-foot airstrip, helipad, and an onsite sample-crushing and splitting preparation laboratory. The company is exploring more than twenty potential gold prospects and seven antimony prospects on its lease.

Nova is pushing for construction of the West Susitna Access Road, which would provide road access to the site. The company is working to become a “fully integrated US antimony producer,” as it says on the company website, and is using a $43.4 million grant from the US Department of War to buy processing equipment to begin processing and refining antimony at Port MacKenzie. Antimony is a chemical element used by the military primarily for lead-acid batteries and in munitions, making it a critical mineral for national defense.

Nova CEO Christopher Gerteisen told shareholders in January, “Fueled by this funding, the company progressed the procurement of antimony key mining and processing equipment—with delivery expected in early 2026—and continued planning and permitting for infrastructure planning at the proposed Port MacKenzie refinery site. With industrial-zoned land secured, strong federal, state, and local government support, and established infrastructure in place, Nova is well positioned to advance toward first antimony production targeted for late 2026 to early 2027.”

Although Nova isn’t the only company pursuing antimony production in Alaska, it may be the first to have a refinery, which it could use to process other companies’ antimony, including re-processing old gold mine tailings, as the two minerals are often found together.

Power Play

Another industrial permit holder at Port MacKenzie is Terra Energy Center Corporation. The company has a permit on more than 1,000 acres around Lake Lorraine, above the port in the uplands, and it just secured a cooperative agreement with the Mat-Su Borough to run a two-year joint marketing effort aimed at bringing businesses with large power needs to Mat-Su, such as industrial users in need of a factory or a large data center.

Terra and its parent company, Flatlands Energy Corporation (itself a subsidiary of Alberta-based Alaska Asia Clean Energy Corporation), hope to build a 1.25 GW power plant in Mat-Su, fueled by coal it intends to mine near Skwentna. The Susitna Basin coal deposit that Flatlands has been exploring holds 521 million tons of coal in reserve, which Terra’s general manager, Chad Schleusner, says is double what is needed to power a 1 GW power plant for thirty years.

The company is aiming for a coal plant that starts with “exceptionally” clean coal. Terra officials say testing has shown the Susitna coal is “exceptionally low” in impurities, with sulphur, arsenic, boron, cadmium, lead, mercury, molybdenum, and selenium content all testing well below the low end of typical US coal ranges. Terra would then go a step further by reinjecting carbon emissions or routing them into beneficial uses, such as running a large greenhouse operation. Impurities that are tolerable from Usibelli Coal Mine would be unsuited for Terra’s carbon-capture method.

“What we’re building is not your granddad’s power plant. It’s a new, modern, state-of-the-art power plant,” Schleusner told the Matanuska Electric Association board at a 2025 presentation. “And when you compare that to LNG imports, it’s cleaner than LNG. When you add on carbon capture, it’s even cleaner than wind with natural gas backup.”

Like Nova’s antimony and gold mine, Terra’s project depends on the West Susitna Access Road project to move forward, in addition to securing an anchor tenant to soak up the extra gigawatt of electricity.

Fueling the Future

Port supporters have high hopes for one potential user currently considering setting up at Port MacKenzie: Crowley Fuels. With 350 employees, Crowley claims the crown as the largest wholesaler of fuel products in Alaska, providing diesel, heating fuel, propane, gasoline, aviation and marine fuels, and packaged petroleum products around Alaska.

Griffin told the Mat-Su Borough Assembly in January that Crowley had signed an agreement for the potential use of 20 to 40 acres at Port MacKenzie. The company is considering using it for a fuel tank farm with storage for up to 20 million gallons of fuel, he reported. It’s a significant project, which would involve investing $20 million to $30 million in fuel lines and equipment to pump the fuel across the dock and up to fuel tanks on the bluff above the port.

“They want to have their own infrastructure,” Griffin told the Assembly. “They could rent or lease it and make some of the money back.”

The signed agreement gives Crowley time to consider its options at the port. Griffin noted that the company hopes to reach a final investment decision in the fall, with the possibilities of fuel deliveries beginning in spring 2027.

David DeCamp, director of corporate communications for Crowley, says it’s too early to talk specifics about the project. “As a company with decades of service and a strong workforce in Alaska, we are committed to long-term growth in the state. As we consider the project, we’re focused on investing in infrastructure that strengthens fuel reliability, expands capacity and supports the communities and businesses we serve. We hope to share more information on our plans later this year,” DeCamp says.

Hosting a tank farm could catapult Port MacKenzie into a new level of operations. Ports rely on repeat users, which not only pay dockage fees for using mooring space but also wharfage fees based on weight or type for cargo loaded or unloaded across a wharf. In this case, it would be a per-gallon fee for fuel crossing the borough’s dock. And the fuel infrastructure, if owned by Crowley, would be available for use by other fuel companies. Central Alaska Energy, a branch of Vitus Energy, also holds a lease at Port MacKenzie, and it could use the Crowley fuel infrastructure as well, meaning more wharfage for the borough and use payments for Crowley.

Covering the Bases

Griffin says Borough Manager Mike Brown encourages him to think of the port like a baseball game. “At Port MacKenzie, we’re really focused on base hits. If we get a home run, that’s awesome. But we’re not always going to swing for the fences and strike out. We have to focus on getting on first, second, and third base,” he says.

The base hits in this scenario are securing regular port users, such as Cruz Construction, QAP, and Northern Gravel and Trucking. Nova, with its antimony processing facility, is a double or a triple, Griffin says. “Crowley would be a home run because that sets the stage for everybody else,” he says. “And obviously the rail would be a home run.”

Griffin and other Mat-Su Borough leaders are hoping the current emphasis on resource development will be enough to push key infrastructure projects the port’s future hangs on—the West Susitna Access Road and the Port MacKenzie Rail Extension—around the bases and home to development, springboarding Port MacKenzie into the thriving facility envisioned when it was created twenty-six years ago.