Alaska codifies carbon storage rules for oil and gas fields in Register 258

Alaska's regulatory framework for underground carbon storage takes effect July 7, 2026, when new Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission rules governing carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) are formally published in Register 258 of the Alaska Administrative Code. The Lieutenant Governor signed and filed the regulations on June 6, 2026. Register 258 is the codification step that makes the rules part of the official Alaska Administrative Code, with July 7 as the effective date. That timeline is separate from the earlier rulemaking phases: AOGCC held a public hearing and accepted written comments through Nov. 28, 2025, and Gov. Mike Dunleavy signed House Bill 50 in 2024, which set the original legal framework for storing carbon underground in Alaska.

The rules set state-level permitting, monitoring, and operational standards for injecting and storing carbon dioxide underground, amending Title 20 of the Alaska Administrative Code. Oil and gas operators gain a defined state permitting pathway, while nearby communities and subsistence users face the groundwater-protection stakes the rules are designed to address. AOGCC representative Tom McKay said at a May 21, 2026, briefing that drinking water protection is central to the program. "The core requirement is that injection must not endanger the underground sources of drinking water," McKay said. "That is particularly important down on the Kenai, of course, because folks have drinking water wells and water wells for their homes and businesses on the Kenai."

Six environmental and tribal organizations, including the Alaska Center, Cook Inlet Keeper, the Center for Biological Diversity, and the Fairbanks Climate Action Coalition, submitted joint comments during the 2025 rulemaking period. They raised concerns about AOGCC's aquifer-exemption and underground-injection approaches and the risks those approaches pose to groundwater and subsistence users. Environmental groups and First Nation people have previously contested AOGCC aquifer exemption orders on similar groundwater-contamination grounds. McKay said at the May 2026 briefing that AOGCC staff were working through those comments before submitting the agency's primacy application to the EPA, which would allow AOGCC to permit and manage Class VI carbon dioxide storage wells directly rather than deferring to federal oversight. The comment period on the adopted regulations has closed. The November 2025 public hearing was the formal opportunity for public input before the rules were finalized and filed.