Project Spotlight: Graphite Creek Project
Meet the Graphite Creek Project!
The first Alaskan mining project to be added to the FAST-41 Dashboard as a Covered Project, Graphite Creek presents a significant opportunity to reestablish a domestic graphite supply chain and strengthen United States energy dominance. Graphite has been identified as a mineral critical to national security, economic and foreign policy, and is an essential material in lithium-ion batteries, fuel cells, and defense technology platforms.
Situated on the Seward Peninsula about 37 miles north of Nome, Alaska, the Graphite Creek Project is a proposed graphite open pit mine to extract graphite ore and produce a graphite concentrate for further processing and manufacturing of Coated Spherical Graphite. The mined minerals will be used primarily for lithium-ion batteries and energy storage markets, as well as other high grade graphite products. The intention to develop the project was announced in early 2017, and on June 2, 2025 the project received FAST-41 coverage, setting the project up for a more efficient and transparent permitting process.
Permitting Council Executive Director, Emily Domenech shared her enthusiasm for the addition of the project on the FAST-41 Dashboard.
“Graphite Creek is critical to achieving President Trump’s energy dominance agenda and is exactly the kind of project that benefits from the transparency and accountability of FAST-41,” she said. “Our team worked with federal agencies to develop an efficient and responsible permitting timetable, and we are excited to partner with Graphite One to get this project to construction.”
Through the development of the coordinated project plan, the Permitting Council and partner agencies worked closely to line up reviews, synchronize milestones, and chart out the most responsible and efficient permitting timeline, saving time from the start.
According to the developer, the most valuable benefit the project has gained under FAST-41 is the ability to be led through a clearly defined process that allows everyone to win by having a mine that protects the environment because it went through the proper reviews, and produces the minerals needed for national security.
“It has been a pleasure working with the FAST-41 permitting team,” said Mike Schaffner, Graphite One’s Senior Vice President of Mining. “Having our project accepted has given the public more transparency into the permitting process by allowing them to see each step of the project timeline on the dashboard. They can see when to engage with the agencies if they have comments and they can also see if there are any delays and what or who is causing the delay. This has really added credibility to the process without sacrificing the quality of the review and analysis.”
The Department of War, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers serves as the lead agency for this project’s permitting and cooperating agencies with actions on the Dashboard include the National Marine Fisheries Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The project is on track to complete federal permitting September 29, 2026, just over a year after receiving FAST-41 coverage.
Last Updated: Thursday, January 22, 2026