On Oct. 5, U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright announced plans for up to $150 million to strengthen Alaska’s electrical transmission system. That was followed by an Oct. 19 announcement by Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy that the administration will invest up to $249 million to complete the long-stalled rail connection to Port MacKenzie. Between those announcements, President Donald Trump promoted the proposed Alaska LNG pipeline and Ambler Road during a mid-term campaign rally in Wasilla.
Those developments are the latest examples of a broader federal effort to address the transportation, energy, financing, and regulatory challenges that have long constrained Alaska mining. The DC interest in Alaska’s energy and minerals, along with the infrastructure needed to support their development, extends from the White House and Pentagon to Capitol Hill.
The policies being advanced to support Alaska mining reflect an understanding in Washington that the nation’s Last Frontier State is incredibly rich in antimony, copper, gold, graphite, silver, zinc, and other mineral resources, but much of that potential remains stranded by high energy costs, limited infrastructure, and political uncertainty.
“The geological potential here is incredible, but it’s like that old quote: ‘water, water everywhere, not a drop to drink’ – that is Alaska in a nutshell in terms of resources, in terms of energy, in terms of power, in terms of infrastructure,” Michael Eckert, general manager of Northern Star Resources’ Pogo gold mine, told Wright at an August energy roundtable in Fairbanks.
Instead of an isolated federal grant or permit decision, the current wave of federal policies to support Alaska’s mining industry spans the entire value chain, from geological discovery and road access to energy supply, mineral processing, and downstream manufacturing. Most initiatives are still years from yielding a mine, but Washington is beginning to tackle several obstacles at once.
Policy to investment
The current wave began with Trump’s Jan. 20, 2025, signing of the “Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential” executive order directing federal agencies to accelerate responsible resource development, revisit restrictions, and prioritize Alaska LNG. That Alaska-centric order on his first day back in the Oval Office was followed by a March order, “Immediate Measures to Increase American Mineral Production,” that broadened those priorities to domestic mining, processing, refining, and smelting. Extending beyond minerals already designated critical, it included copper, gold, uranium, and other strategically important materials.
The national order also directed agencies to identify projects for expedited permitting and consider federal financing programs to encourage mineral production. Together, the two orders provided a policy framework for addressing barriers that have historically slowed Alaska projects.
Doug Burgum
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum informed resource industry leaders attending a recent event in Fairbanks that more than 90% of the Alaska order’s 51 action items had been completed.
“They’re literally check-marked, done, completed,” he said during the Oct. 14 gathering.
Among the items checked off the list is the reauthorization of a 211-mile road to the Ambler Mining District, a mineral-rich region of Northwest Alaska that illustrates a shift from Alaska resource policy to action. In October 2025, Trump approved Ambler Road, which would connect the Dalton Highway to the district’s copper-zinc deposits.
Trump’s October 2025 approval of the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority’s appeal of the previous administration’s denial of federal authorizations for the proposed Ambler Road coincided with a $35.6 million Pentagon investment in Trilogy Metals Inc., which owns a 50% interest in Ambler Metals, a joint venture formed with South32 Ltd. to explore and develop mines in the Ambler Mining District.
The transaction, completed in September, made the federal government an approximately 10% shareholder in Trilogy, with warrants for additional ownership.
The investment supports the Upper Kobuk Mineral Projects, a large package of state and Alaska Native-owned lands in the Ambler District that encompass the Arctic copper-zinc-lead-gold-silver and Bornite copper-cobalt deposits.
Arctic, envisioned as the district’s first mine, has been accepted into the federal FAST-41 permitting program, which coordinates environmental reviews and makes schedules more transparent. A state and federal schedule published in July targets completion of permitting in September 2028.
Road access, permitting coordination, and federal financing in the Ambler District are moving forward together. But the road still needs financing and development work, and Alaska Native organizations and communities hold differing views of its potential benefits and consequences.
Development of the Ambler District also has its own internal challenge – the economics of Arctic depend on the certainty that a road will be built, while the proposed Ambler toll road needs to know that there will be mine traffic to pay for its construction and upkeep.
During an October roundtable with Secretary Wright, Ambler Metals Permitting Manager Cal Craig put this interdependency in the simplest terms: “No mine, no road. No road, no mine.”
Earlier this year, Burgum said the administration is examining federal financial support for the road, which could break that deadlock and potentially return profits to American taxpayers.
“I don’t think that’s going to be an issue, because the resource there is so rich,” the Interior Secretary said in response to questions about the road. “I think the road financing will come together, particularly since there’s going to be a financial return.”
Whether the pieces come together will test Washington’s emerging strategy to pair federal investment and permitting support in Alaska with shared infrastructure that private mining companies have struggled to finance alone.
Mines to markets
The Port MacKenzie rail extension offers another example of federal investment reaching beyond individual mine sites.
The $249 million Federal Railroad Administration award announced by Duffy in mid-October provides most of the funding to complete the 32-mile spur that would link Port MacKenzie to the Alaska Railroad mainline, which extends to Fairbanks in the mineral-rich heart of Alaska.
Located across Knik Arm from Anchorage, Port MacKenzie offers extensive industrial land and deepwater access. A completed rail link would likely make this the port of choice for shipping large volumes of mineral concentrates and other commodities out of the state, as well as incoming shipments of bulk goods, such as pipe and equipment for the Alaska LNG project.
Nova Minerals Corp. is already leveraging the industrial lands available at Port MacKenzie. In 2025, the Pentagon awarded its Alaska Range Resources subsidiary $43.4 million in Defense Production Act funding to advance a domestic antimony supply chain that includes mining stibnite at its Estelle project about 100 miles west of Port MacKenzie, and upgrading that material to antimony trisulfide and metal at a processing plant currently being constructed near the port. With the major equipment needed to build the antimony refinery recently delivered, Nova is targeting initial production from the refinery in 2027.
Used in ammunition, military electronics, and flame retardants, antimony is a national security priority for Washington. Federal funding for Nova’s industrial development at Port MacKenzie and the rail extension could reinforce one another while benefiting other mines.
The proposed Arctic mine is one of the likely beneficiaries of a future rail link. Ambler Metals’ current mine plan calls for trucking metal concentrates from the mine to Fairbanks, then shipping them by rail to the port in Anchorage. A Port MacKenzie connection would offer a more direct and logistically simpler route from the Railbelt to tidewater.
Delivering Arctic mine concentrates to market via Port MacKenzie remains contingent on development of both the Arctic mine and Ambler Road, further demonstrating the interconnectivity of the multiple mining-related projects being supported by the administration and a growing number of policymakers on Capitol Hill.
Powering Alaska’s potential
Reliable, affordable energy is as essential to mines and mineral processors as transportation.
That relationship dominated a mining and energy roundtable convened by Wright in August.
During that meeting, former International Tower Hill Mines CEO Karl Hanneman described the Railbelt electrical system as an “extension cord” – a largely linear network with limited redundancy.
The Energy Department addressed this constraint on Alaska Railbelt energy with an Oct. 5 announcement that it plans to invest up to $150 million in the Beluga-Healy Transmission Project. The approximately $418 million project would add 223 miles of high-voltage lines, creating a second electrical connection along the Railbelt connecting Southcentral and Interior Alaska.
The improvement would strengthen a system serving roughly 75% of Alaskans, major military installations, and industrial customers. The proposed federal support is being pursued through the Defense Production Act, linking electrical reliability with national security. Wright specifically identified mining and resource industries among the beneficiaries, reflecting a view that energy and mineral supply chains depend on one another.
“You can’t mine without huge energy resources; you can’t produce great energy resources without the metals from mining to build all the infrastructure,” Wright said at the Fairbanks roundtable.
Major construction is not expected before 2030, but a more robust electrical grid could eventually improve the reliability and flexibility of an electrical grid serving Alaska residents, businesses, military bases, and mines close enough to plug into Railbelt power.
The proposed Alaska LNG project presents a similar opportunity. An approximately 800-mile pipeline would connect the North Slope’s enormous natural gas resources to Southcentral Alaska, supplying in-state customers and a proposed liquefaction facility for Asian export markets. Trump has made moving Alaska LNG forward a priority.
During his campaign stop in Wasilla, Trump pointed to permitting progress and proposed LNG purchases and investments involving Taiwan and South Korea. Those commercial arrangements remain under negotiation, and Alaska LNG has not secured the commitments required for a final investment decision.
One possible mining connection is a preliminary agreement between Alaska LNG developer Glenfarne and the owners of Donlin Gold to evaluate a roughly 315-mile natural gas pipeline to the enormous Southwest Alaska gold project.
For Donlin, access to North Slope natural gas would offer an alternative to importing LNG, which could improve the economics of one of the world’s largest undeveloped gold deposits. For Alaska LNG, a large industrial customer could create additional in-state demand that helps support the larger gas transportation system.
Other mines and processing facilities might also benefit, potentially allowing Alaska to realize more value from its energy and mineral wealth through in-state processing and refining.
Mines to manufacturing
Washington’s broader minerals strategy also extends downstream to the processing plants and manufacturers that turn minerals into usable products.
Graphite One Inc. offers an example of a company working to establish a supply chain that connects Alaska’s minerals to downstream buyers. Its Graphite Creek project, about 30 miles north of Nome, hosts the nation’s largest known graphite deposit and underpins plans for an integrated American supply chain. Graphite produced at the Western Alaska mine would be delivered to a facility in Ohio that would produce lithium battery anode material and other advanced graphite products – establishing a direct connection between Alaska’s resource base and American manufacturing.
A $37.5 million Defense Production Act award in 2023 helped advance Graphite One’s feasibility study, showing that federal support for Alaska minerals predates the current administration.
That interest has continued. In June, Environmental Protection Agency Deputy Administrator David Fotouhi met with local and regional leaders, toured Nome’s expanding port facilities, and visited Graphite Creek. The trip gave senior federal environmental leadership a firsthand look at both the promise and the logistical challenges of mineral development in remote Alaska.
Graphite One has also received letters of interest from the Export-Import Bank of the United States for loans that would cover roughly $2.1 billion of the costs to develop the Graphite Creek Mine and Ohio advanced graphite materials plant.
Federal policy is also encouraging a stronger connection between mineral producers and downstream customers. A July executive order, “Securing America’s Defense Supply Chains and Ensuring Domestic Acquisition of Critical Materials,” directs the Pentagon to trace critical materials through military procurement supply chains, strengthen requirements to replace unreliable foreign sources, and speed qualification of domestic and allied materials.
Those stronger domestic sourcing requirements could lead manufacturers to develop commercial relationships with Alaska producers of antimony, graphite, copper, and other materials critical to military readiness before those mines enter production.
Such relationships could provide another source of confidence for investors evaluating long-lead-time projects.
Beyond the administration, Alaska is gaining attention from Washington lawmakers across the political spectrum. More than 130 Alaska business leaders attended April’s Alaska on the Hill gathering to discuss permitting, transportation, energy, and American resource supply chains with members of Congress.
Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming and Reps. Bruce Westerman of Arkansas, Tom Suozzi of New York, and Pete Stauber of Minnesota were among the Capitol Hill policymakers who set aside time to express their support for Alaska and its resource sectors.
“As long as I’m privileged to serve in the House of Representatives, Alaska will have no better advocate,” Pete Stauber told the business leaders.
Stauber was also part of a Congressional Western Caucus group of lawmakers from Utah, Texas, Colorado, and Minnesota, including Caucus Chair Celeste Maloy, that toured Alaska in August.
During that visit, the delegation toured Nova’s Estelle project and U.S. GoldMining Inc.’s nearby Whistler copper-gold project, providing them with a firsthand look at the need for transportation and power systems that could turn those resources into economically viable mines. The visit also demonstrates that Capitol Hill interest in Alaska’s mineral wealth is not limited to Alaska’s own delegation.
That wider political base matters in Alaska, where deposits may require decades of exploration, engineering, environmental review, and construction before production. Predictable permitting and durable federal policies and support are essential if investors are to commit capital through changes in political leadership.
Lawmakers may disagree on resource development, but common ground is emerging on the need to cut America’s reliance on adversaries for critical minerals, as well as the need for a reliable path to permitting projects in the U.S.
Congressional interest also reaches back to the earliest stage of mineral development.
DC interest in Alaska mines
Since Trump’s January 2025 Alaska order, federal engagement has moved beyond directives to investments, agency visits, permitting schedules, and infrastructure commitments. The initiatives are beginning to reinforce one another: access roads could serve new mines, mine demand could help support energy projects, and procurement policies could connect Alaska producers with American manufacturers.
But support from one presidential administration does not guarantee a mine. The time it takes to prove a discovery can support an economic mine, obtain financing and permits, solve transportation and energy problems, and build workable relationships with local communities takes years and is often measured in decades.
The durability of federal interest – not simply its intensity today – will help determine which opportunities advance.
Alaska has never lacked mineral potential. What has been missing is the alignment of infrastructure, reliable energy, investment, permitting certainty, and markets.
Washington is now addressing those constraints on several fronts, an effort that will ultimately be measured by the mines, infrastructure, supply chains, and lasting economic benefits it produces.