**Title**: Energy in the North - Grace Nakimayak
**Date**: October 16, 2024
**Participants**: Amanda Byrd, Grace Nakimayak


00;00;00;21 - 00;00;03;28 [Grace Nakimayak] I'm excited to work myself out of a job, but I mean that in a good way

00;00;05;22 - 00;00;09;00 [Amanda Byrd] This week on Energy in the North, we speak with Grace Nakimayak, the clean energy coordinator for the Paulatak Clean Energy Working Group. Paulatak is a Hamlet of the Inuvialut settlement region of Canada's Northwest Territories, and it's adjacent to Amundsen Gulf on the Arctic Ocean. I first met Grace in 2022 in Whitehorse, Yukon during the Arctic Remote Energy Networks Academy, or ARENA, Canada Program. And more recently we met again during the Alaska ARENA on site program in Kotzebue. I started our conversation by asking Grace to tell me a little bit about her community.

00;00;40;22 - 00;00;43;18 [Grace Nakimayak] There is approximately 320 people in Paulitak is a remote community. We're flying only, and in terms of food security, or our insecurity as well too is we face a really high cost of living. Our food and our land is our livelihood, but it also really significantly decreases, having to rely on going to the store for food.

00;01;04;11 - 00;01;12;15 [Amanda Byrd] In Alaska, heating and electricity are often the highest expenses in a household, especially in remote communities. What are the energy costs like in Paulatak?

00;01;12;15 - 00;01;13;22 [Grace Nakimayak] In 2018 a nonprofit organization called the Arctic Energy Alliance in the Northwest Territories, They did community energy profiles it was well over $3 million just to provide heat and electricity for 320 people.

00;01;29;20 - 00;01;40;05 [Amanda Byrd] There's a movement in Alaska to increase the penetration of renewables into our remote community, microgrids, to help reduce the reliance on expensive imported diesel fuel for heating and electricity.

00;01;40;05 - 00;01;43;28 [Grace Nakimayak] So right now our community is currently developing a wind, solar and battery energy storage system project. So our goal is to eventually, be 100% renewable for heating and electricity. It's a very ambitious goal and we haven't put a time stamp on it because, you know, as the world is evolving, as technology is evolving, we'd like to develop the capacity and the infrastructure to move forward, to aspire our goal through different phases. And solar and wind is intermittent. But, you know, the battery game is coming in strong.

00;02;13;11 - 00;02;19;23 [Amanda Byrd] Being right on that Arctic Ocean, It seems like there could be impacts from warming ocean and increased storms.

00;02;19;23 - 00;02;25;05 [Grace Nakimayak] In the north. We face the impacts of climate change for four times faster than the rest of the world so we're struggling with coastal erosion and warming waters. Our harvesting seasons are coming sooner and ending faster. Our permafrost is starting to slump although we have a very small demand, we still feel like it's very important to become a little bit more sustainable.

00;02;46;25 - 00;02;51;18 [Amanda Byrd] It seems like the role of clean energy coordinator for your community is a really important job right now.

00;02;52;17 - 00;02;56;22 [Grace Nakimayak] Yeah, I'm excited to work myself out of a job, but I mean that in a good way that we're developing further capacity within our community members, and some of our youth to, to work into jobs like these because of the lifespans of renewable projects exceed 20 to 25 years. So I think that's, that's what I'm looking forward to and I'm, I'm looking forward to continuing to have our community's support and backing to continue our project. Yeah, I feel like it's valuable for my community because of the work I do our with our energy working group. In the midst of developing renewables into our community, which is entirely reliant on diesel for for heating and electricity.

00;03;40;08 - 00;03;52;10 [Amanda Byrd] Grace Nakimayak is the clean energy coordinator for the Paulatak Clean Energy Working Group in Canada's Northwest Territories. And I'm Amanda Byrd, chief storyteller for the Alaska Center for Energy and Power at UAF. Find this story and more at uaf.edu/acep.