During the arms race between the US and the USSR which took place from the 1940's to the 1960's, both superpowers had their own testing areas. The US always tested its bombs in Nevada or the South Pacific, while the USSR tested its bombs in Siberia. So, that got me wondering, how come we didn't test our nukes in Alaska? Much like Siberia, Alaska had miles and miles of uninhabited wasteland, so it would make sense to use it as a testing ground. So how come we never tested nuclear weapons there? Was it because Alaska was too close to Russia?
The US actually did test nuclear weapons in Alaska...
(And separate from that. Alaska is not a wasteland... It is a wilderness. There is a difference. Wastelands are cultivated or civilized areas that have been allowed to become overgrown. Wildernesses are lands that have not been extensively modified by humans.)
It is remote and difficult to stage testing in. It is not uninhabited or devoid of wildlife, and the local economy depends heavily on that wildlife being uncontaminated. It has a lot of seismic activity (which did come up as an issue when they did the underground testing I linked to above). It is not a place with preexisting "proving grounds" for testing bombs or the like. There are about a million reasons why Alaska is not a great place to do nuclear testing (esp. aboveground testing)... the only thing it really has going for it in that respect is that it is sparsely populated (which is why it was used briefly for underground testing in the 1970s).
I am sure /r/The_Alaskan can add a lot more information.