Alaska’s complex relationship with fossil fuels by Larry Persily Oil and gas production —and the good-paying jobs that come with it—have helped fuel the Alaskan economy for decades, and likely will for the near future. The far future is less certain. The industry’s tax and royalty revenues to the state treasury have allowed Alaskans to enjoy life without a personal income tax or a state sales tax—plus, they receive an annual dividend from investment earnings of the state’s 46-year-old oil-wealth savings account. Oil transportation methods have come a long way since the early days. Here, in about 1905, a team of horses owned by the W. J. Rowe Transfer Company hauls an oil tank in the snow for the John J. Sesnon Company in Nome. Sesnon had come to Nome during the gold rush and established several businessesCourtesy Frank H. Nowell, Wikimedia Commons But there are a lot fewer of…