The weather climate in Alaska is immaterial; the major deleterious climate is political--environmental concerns. People cry themselves to sleep every night over the loss of the caribou calving grounds. Even though there's no such thing and the acreage isn't being lost. Point is, oil is 90% of the economy of Alaska, and a population of 600,000 is all we can manage on that. Maybe somebody else is getting rich off Alaska oil, it isn't Alaska.