Alaska is ready to play a key role in America’s energy future

By Clark Penney

This is a lightly edited excerpt of testimony recently provided to the U.S. House’s Natural Resources Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee hearing "Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential."

Everything is big in Alaska, including our natural resource projects and therefore our solutions for our country. Alaska has known quantities of 49 critical minerals; no other state can say this. And contrary to common rhetoric, Alaskan residents are in support of responsibly developing those resources. Per a statewide survey conducted by Dittman Research in May 2025, 72 percent of Alaskans are in favor of oil and gas development and 67 percent favor new critical mineral projects.

The objective now is: how do we get these vast resources to market -- from Alaska, for America. The U.S. all but eliminated its position on critical mineral development for the last 30 years. To fill that gap, foreign entities of concern, known as FEOCs, and other countries we do not have the best of relations with have stepped in. Resource development, like nature, loathes a vacuum. 

Well, Alaskans and Alaska are up for a challenge. I’m very encouraged by the direction this administration is heading with support for the critical mineral industry. As someone with an investment background, I want to see dollars executed efficiently and supporting industry that creates jobs, a circular economy, and equips our country to innovate, invest and excel, as our American system does without parallel.

But this will take all the tools in the U.S. policy toolbox -- and maybe even some new ones. We are competing against countries that think of timelines in generations, not quarter by quarter. Those same countries have used their governments to subsidize needed infrastructure to get critical mineral projects to market. We don’t have to copy them, but we need to compete apples to apples – in our distinct American way.

To do that, first, we must make sure U.S. policy – at the Department of the Interior, the Department of War, the Department of Energy, and across the federal government – demonstrates a clear preference for domestic critical mineral developers. Allies can help, but there is no substitute for home-grown, Alaskan and American resources to fuel American innovation and the American economy.

Second – use every tool in the kit. All of the Defense Production Act’s authorities. Not just stockpile purchases but long-term "commitments to purchase” to pull projects forward by signaling strategic interest.

And that’s my third point: if government sends the signal, and maintains the signal, private investment will respond.

Ultimately, there is a path in which private capital can come to the table more willingly. But the question to explore is simply this: how can investors assess the risk of a project with an unknown timeline, an unshaped supply chain, and a commodity price that can be manipulated by a nation opposed to American interests?  

There is a way for America to secure full domestic supply chains for every single critical mineral. Alaska is ready to play a significant role, the storehouse of so many strategic resources.  And it will take boldness, good ideas, creative solutions, and the mindset of grinding every day -- not so different than being an Alaskan.

Clark Penney is the President of Penney Capital. 

_{*The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of EnergyPlatform.News.}