INDIGENOUS POWER & LIGHT
COMMUNITY SPOTLIGHT SERIES

THE BARGE DOESN'T WAIT.

Port Heiden, Alaska

Flexible Capital at the Right Moment

In Port Heiden, missing the shipping season can mean delaying the start of construction by a year.

Flexible bridge financing from IPLF helped keep this critical energy project on schedule. Interested in learning more? Contact development@tribalcleanenergy.org.

A Remote Community
with Big Ambitions

The Native Village of Port Heiden lies on the remote Alaska Peninsula, 424 air miles from Anchorage. With no road or ferry connection to the rest of Alaska, the community relies on barges to transport heavy equipment — and those barges can only reach the Village during the ice-free months.

Working in partnership with Intelligent Energy Systems, Port Heiden had already done the hard work, investing significant time and resources to plan and advance a transformative clean energy project. Through those efforts, the Village secured a $1.68 million USDA grant to develop a wind, battery storage, and heating system projected to displace approximately 30,000 gallons of diesel annually.

But securing the grant was only part of the challenge.

Like many federal grants, the USDA award operates on a reimbursement basis, requiring Tribes and Alaska Native Villages to cover project costs upfront and wait for repayment. For Port Heiden, that created a critical timing gap: equipment had to be ordered months in advance to arrive during the short barge season, long before federal reimbursement funds would be available.

Without access to bridge financing, the Village risked missing the shipping window — and losing another year of progress toward greater energy independence.

Through the Indigenous Power and Light Fund℠, in partnership with the Ishkode Fund, the Alliance provided

$250,000

in recoverable

bridge financing

so the project could stay on schedule.

How Recoverable Grants Work

IPLF advances Capital

Bridges the funding gap

Port Heiden Moves Forward

Equipment secured. Project advances

USDA
Reimburses

Eligible project costs repaid

Capital Returns
to IPLF

Ready to support the next Tribal project

WHAT PORT HEIDEN IS BUILDING TOWARD

30k

gallons of diesel displaced
each year.

$72k

in estimated fuel savings kept in the community.

25%+

of the community's power
supplied by wind and
battery storage.

Less dependence on imported diesel. More energy dollars staying at home. Greater control over the community’s energy future.

When a project is ready to move, the capital should be too.

Port Heiden had the vision, the project and major federal funding already in place. What it needed was financing that could respond to the realities of the project timeline.

The Indigenous Power & Light Fund℠ provides flexible capital designed to work alongside Tribal leadership, federal funding and other partners when conventional financing doesn’t align with what a project needs — or when it needs it.