Arctic port study highlights Nome and Teller

Two western Alaska communities will get scrutiny as possible deep-water ports for Arctic vessels.

Nome and nearby Port Clarence, a safe harbor near the small community of Teller, are the choices for additional analysis in a report completed by the state of Alaska and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Both Nome and Teller are south of the Bering Strait and the Arctic Circle but are far closer to Arctic waters than Kodiak, the nearest Coast Guard base.

The study stems from a 2008 conference put on by the Corps and the state Department of Transportation that identified the need for deep-water ports serving the Arctic as summer ice melt marine traffic increase in the region.

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