STANDING BEAT · 24 ARTICLES · 3 TRACKED DECISIONS

Alaska AI research and science

The university labs, the agencies and the field science using machine learning on Alaska problems.

Where this beat stands

Alaska AI tracks 3 decisions on this beat, each one with the documents it was verified against. None are open for public comment right now, which is worth knowing before assuming there is still a door open. The nearest date is Sep 14 on The Navy's permit for an under-ice robot navigation grid. The bodies deciding on this beat include Alaska Department of Administration, Office of Procurement and Property Management, Alaska Department of Administration, Division of Motor Vehicles and NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service, Office of Protected Resources.

Decisions on this beat

  1. Alaska's statewide speech-to-text contract

    Pending decision · Alaska Department of Administration, Office of Procurement and Property Management

    Alaska is soliciting one statewide contract to convert speech, live or recorded, into written text for general, medical and legal records. The notice says every state governmental entity may use the resulting contract, naming the Legislative Branch, the Court System, the University of Alaska, boards and commissions, cities, boroughs, school districts and federally recognized tribes. The public notice does not use the terms artificial intelligence, machine learning or automated speech recognition.

    1 source on file · the full record

  2. DMV asks vendors about automated compliance for commercial licenses

    Watching · Alaska Department of Administration, Division of Motor Vehicles

    The Division of Motor Vehicles asked vendors for products, services, technical approaches and industry best practices related to automated compliance and data integration systems supporting the commercial driver's license program. The public notice does not use the terms artificial intelligence or machine learning.

    1 source on file · the full record

  3. The Navy's permit for an under-ice robot navigation grid

    Decided · NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service, Office of Protected Resources · Sep 14

    NMFS has authorized the Office of Naval Research to harass marine mammals incidental to Year 9 of its Arctic Research Activities in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, and what the authorization covers is an acoustic navigation grid. Up to six moored sources at 900 to 950 Hz and two drifting ice gateway buoys will transmit a 30 second pulse every four hours for one year, so that gliders operating under sea ice can fix a position by trilateration from those sources rather than by dead reckoning. The study area is about 639,237 square kilometres across the US Exclusive Economic Zone, the high seas north of Alaska and part of the Canadian Exclusive Economic Zone, coming within 204 kilometres of the Alaska coast at its nearest point. A research cruise of 22 days is planned to begin September 22nd, 2026 aboard R/V Sikuliaq, US Coast Guard Cutter HEALY or another vessel, while the sound sources stay in the water for twelve months. The authorization covers Level B harassment only and states that take by Level A harassment is neither anticipated nor authorized.

    4 sources on file · the full record

Every one of these is also in the full Alaska AI Docket, published as open data at /data/ under CC BY 4.0.

Articles on this beat

The Permit Knows Where the Machine Is cover

The Permit Knows Where the Machine Is

SEPTEMBER 12, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

Beaufort beluga. Abundance estimate 39,258 from a 1992 survey.

Alaska AI Contracts and the Comma That Hides One cover

Alaska AI Contracts and the Comma That Hides One

SEPTEMBER 7, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

Zero records in common. One contract ends September 10th, 2026. Leisnoi Professional Services, $20,632,119.41 obligated, 8(a) sole source.

Run Both Instruments, or Lose the Record cover

Run Both Instruments, or Lose the Record

SEPTEMBER 6, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

NOAA Fisheries wrote up the framework on September 3rd. The instrument is allowed to change. What the survey reports is not. The common way to buy that is to run both instruments in...

One Race Late. The limit and the money it missed. cover

One Race Late. The limit and the money it missed.

SEPTEMBER 5, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

Six people who list Anthropic as their employer gave $372,000 between February 3rd and May 7th. The company gave nothing.

Eight Machines, One Sheet cover

Eight Machines, One Sheet

AUGUST 30, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

$6,518,029 to PeaceHealth Ketchikan Medical Center for robotic assisted surgery. A surgeon drives it.

Written Before the Water cover

Written Before the Water

AUGUST 29, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

45 minutes separate them. No published column carries that code.

Thirty Lake Beds After a Cold Alaska Winter cover

Thirty Lake Beds After a Cold Alaska Winter

AUGUST 28, 2026 · 6 SLIDES

It launched an Arctic lake drainage tool on August 13th, 2026.

Nineteen Flares Over the Kenai, and One Number cover

Nineteen Flares Over the Kenai, and One Number

AUGUST 27, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

Rainmaker's report puts the precipitation attributed to seeding at a mean of 57.62 acre feet, in a 5th to 95th percentile range of 41.70 to 89.35.

Five Surfaces cover

Five Surfaces

AUGUST 26, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

The air above them gets a model for the weather windows safe enough for a prescribed burn. The ground under them gets one that forecasts landslides. Coal refuse and ash get read for...

The Proving Sky cover

The Proving Sky

AUGUST 18, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

The FAA award to Air Space Intelligence runs 875 million dollars over a reported 12 years. It funds SMART and the FMDS flow platform for the national airspace.

The Equal-Award Projection, 552 to 1 cover

The Equal-Award Projection, 552 to 1

AUGUST 14, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

NSF's new AI Infrastructure Hubs program caps both at one award.

No Wire Leaves Cordova. So the Load Moved In. cover

No Wire Leaves Cordova. So the Load Moved In.

AUGUST 12, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

No transmission line leaves Cordova. 170 kilowatts of computing sits inside the Humpback Creek powerhouse. "The server was literally 20 feet from the generators," said Clay Koplin, CEO of...

Redoubt Weir. Lit To Install, Dark To Run cover

Redoubt Weir. Lit To Install, Dark To Run

AUGUST 8, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

Fish and Game put the Redoubt annual subsistence limit at 100 sockeye per household effective July 1st. Jeff Feldpausch of the Sitka Tribe told KCAW it was 50 before, and that the weir is...

What the Notice Buys and What It Doesn't Print cover

What the Notice Buys and What It Doesn't Print

AUGUST 2, 2026 · 10 SLIDES

Vendors have 22 days to bid on one statewide contract to convert speech, live or recorded, into written or electronic text. It closes 9:30 A.M. on 24 August. Four days earlier the DMV's...

Alaska's One Row on the Federal AI List cover

Alaska's One Row on the Federal AI List

JULY 30, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

Alaska's one federal AI award points at the grid, not at the new load.

The Machine Makes Time. Who Owns the Clock? cover

The Machine Makes Time. Who Owns the Clock?

JULY 29, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

Computer vision picks the fish and the path. Brain spiked, gills cut, iced, 6.5 seconds or less by Shinkei's count.

Governed First, Alaska Native Health and AI cover

Governed First, Alaska Native Health and AI

JULY 23, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

It is a Tribe's right to govern what gets collected, who owns it, and what gets built on top.

A Better Ear Is Not a Recovery cover

A Better Ear Is Not a Recovery

JULY 21, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

NOAA Fisheries, Microsoft AI for Good and Alaska Fish and Game built a two stage listener, one model flags a sound, another names the species. A separate NOAA effort is adding satellite...

Reading the Frozen Ground at the Top of America cover

Reading the Frozen Ground at the Top of America

JULY 19, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

A Penn State team fused physics equations with machine learning into a digital twin of that embankment, fed by three winters of thermal and seismic data. This is narrow, physics-informed...

No Road Out. Quinhagak Flies Its Own Eyes cover

No Road Out. Quinhagak Flies Its Own Eyes

JULY 17, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

In the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, search and rescue calls come weekly, sometimes daily, and outside operators cannot read the airspace. So the village corporation trains its own FAA Part 107...

Alaska's Critical Mineral Engine, and Its Unbuilt AI cover

Alaska's Critical Mineral Engine, and Its Unbuilt AI

JULY 15, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

On July 14 the NSF named a University of Alaska Fairbanks coalition its Critical Mineral Accelerator Engine. It starts with 15 million dollars in hand, with up to 160 million over ten years...

First Machine to the Fire cover

First Machine to the Fire

JULY 12, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

This is the XPRIZE Wildfire autonomous track, an 11 million dollar contest field-tested through the University of Alaska Fairbanks. The winner is expected in September 2026.

The Machine That Hears a Mountain Think cover

The Machine That Hears a Mountain Think

JULY 10, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

Great Sitkin is erupting lava. Kupreanof and Shishaldin are stirring, and about 50,000 people fly over that airspace every day.

One River, Two Ways to Count It, AI vs the Tower cover

One River, Two Ways to Count It, AI vs the Tower

JULY 9, 2026 · 9 SLIDES

On the Wood River the drone launches itself at 8:30 a.m. and films the run below. A computer-vision model is being trained to count the fish, but it is not trained yet.

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