A dam licensed near Juneau 10 years ago still isn't built, and its deadline just passed

Federal regulators licensed a hydroelectric dam south of Juneau ten years ago. Nothing has been built. The deadline to start construction expired last week — and Juneau's utility says the town doesn't need the power anyway.

Juneau Hydropower has held the license since Sept. 8, 2016, to dam the outlet of Lower Sweetheart Lake, about 30 miles south of the city in the Tongass National Forest. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission still lists the project as unconstructed.

In May, the company asked for more time — two additional years to break ground, pushing that deadline to 2028, and two more to finish, moving completion from 2029 to 2031. It supplemented the request three times over the summer.

A federal law signed in May gives the commission room to grant it. The law lets regulators extend construction deadlines by up to six years beyond what was already allowed, for projects licensed before 2020, in two-year increments. The commission says this would be the first such extension it has authorized under the new law. If it eventually granted all three, Juneau Hydropower would not have to start building until 2032 — 16 years after getting its license.

Alaska Electric Light and Power has told the commission the power isn't needed. Juneau's existing hydro plants already run with surplus capacity, the utility said, and the community has no present need for what Sweetheart Lake would add.

The project as designed would put a roller-compacted concrete dam about 111 feet high across the lake outlet, generating close to 20 megawatts. The Forest Service signed off on its use of federal land in 2017. Separately, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said last year it was weighing a rural development loan for the project; no decision has surfaced since.

What the federal record doesn't contain is any explanation from the company — why nothing was built, what the project costs now, or whether it has financing. Across a decade of filings, the only trace of Juneau Hydropower is a contact name, Duff W. Mitchell, listed in the same role in 2014 and again this year. Nothing from the City and Borough of Juneau, area tribes or conservation groups appears either.

The commission is taking comments and formal objections until Oct. 1. It hasn't said when it will rule.