Petro Marine wants a new Wrangell fuel dock, saying its floats nearly touch bottom

Petro Marine Services wants to tear out its fuel dock in Wrangell's Reliance Harbor and build a new one, saying the dock's two fuel floats rest nearly on the harbor floor at low tide. That could damage the floats and keep fuel barges from reaching the dock, the company says in a permit application to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which posted notice of it Thursday.

The application calls the facility the main fuel supplier in Wrangell Harbor and says the floats and their support piles are past their useful life.

The project would remove two piers, two floats, their gangways and the fuel sales building, along with 100 timber piles and eight steel ones. The old structures would be disposed of locally or barged to Seattle. In their place would go a pier 15 feet wide and 328 feet long and an 80-foot gangway to a 200-by-25-foot concrete float with a new fuel sales building. The new steel piles would be set about 10 to 13 feet into bedrock.

Construction would start in summer 2027, with about 64 hours of pile work spread over about 51 days.

The Corps found the work may affect humpback whales from the threatened Mexico population and endangered western Steller sea lions, and it will consult the National Marine Fisheries Service before deciding. The Corps can't issue a permit until the state Department of Environmental Conservation grants or waives water quality certification.

Petro Marine isn't proposing compensatory mitigation. It says the only expected discharge is a small amount of drill cuttings in an already developed marine industrial area. It plans to keep spill response equipment on site and not use wood treated with creosote or pentachlorophenol.

The company is also seeking approvals to rebuild its fuel docks in Juneau and Ketchikan, as Alaska News reported Sept. 9 and Oct. 15. The Corps is taking comments on the Wrangell plan through Nov. 23.