It’s hard to know where to begin unpacking the U.S. State Department’s Final Environmental Impact Statement on the controversial Keystone XL, the transcontinental pipeline that has been proposed to transport heavy crude oil from the tar sands of Alberta to the Gulf Coast of Louisiana. On one hand, the document admits that from “wells to […]
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Closed roads remind Silverton and the West of our dependence on transportation
Since Jan. 12, rocks have been raining down on Highway 550 on the north side of Red Mountain Pass in southwestern Colorado. Cold nights and warm days created a freeze/thaw cycle that pried loose a huge chunk of the rocky mountainside, which then broke into thousands of boulders. In order to stabilize the rocks to […]
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Rants from the Hill: The Great Basin Sea Monster
“Rants from the Hill” are Michael Branch’s monthly musings on life in the high country of western Nevada’s Great Basin Desert. Last Saturday around noon I was still feeling desperate for more alone time when my daughters Hannah (age 10) and Caroline (age 7) asked if I was finally ready to play with them. I […]
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‘Ag-gag’ law that thwarts investigations on factory farms is challenged in Utah
Last year was a good one for whistleblowers on factory farms: not one of the 11 “ag-gag” bills introduced across the U.S. in 2013 became law, and so far in 2014 two such bills, in the New Hampshire and Indiana legislatures, have been defeated by animal rights activists. What agribusiness calls farm protection laws – […]
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New farm bill still favors big ag
We’ve been following the glacial progress of the latest Farm Bill for three years now. This massive bill, passed every five years, doles out nearly $1 trillion for food stamps and school lunches, farm subsidies, and conservation programs. The Farm Bill got its start during the Dust Bowl years, when it was meant as temporary […]
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For better or worse, feds’ Columbia River Salmon plan stays the course
There’s no arguing that salmon and steelhead in the Columbia and Snake Rivers have had a tough century. Habitat loss, overfishing, and, most of all, dam construction have reduced the prodigious runs, which once averaged 16 million fish per year, to a fraction of their former glory. What’s up for debate is whether the federal […]
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Preserving ancient art in land marked for solar energy development
Like a great eye of reflective silicon, the largest utility-scale power plant in the United States is rapidly materializing in the Mojave Desert. According to company officials, when fully complete, the BrightSource Ivanpah Solar Power Facility will come on line early this year, supplying nearly 400 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 140,000 homes during […]
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Union Address: Climate change still real, federal action still lacking
For any American who believes that climate change is not only real but one of the most pressing issues of our time, it’s oddly invigorating to hear one’s President declare the debate “settled,” as Obama did last night in his State of the Union address. “Climate change is a fact,” he followed. It’s exciting to […]
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BLM considers grassroots land use plan that would limit drilling in western Colorado
Mark Waltermire squints in the winter sunlight, craning his neck to take in the view from his vegetable farm in Hotchkiss, Colo. He jabs his finger toward a mesa: “There,” he says. “And up in there.” Palm to the sky, he makes a sweeping gesture, encompassing the flat-bottomed valley, the staggered mesas; the patchwork of […]
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In a new study, megafauna more likely to feel climate impacts than smaller species
Climate change has always picked winners and losers from the animal world. Some, like unbearably cute, mountain-dwelling pikas are already retreating from lower, warmer elevations in places like Yosemite National Park, and heading for cooler heights. Beyond existing research on how climate change is responsible for certain species, like pikas or polar bears, shifting elevation, […]
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Vegas’ new water czar has a tough row to hoe
John Entsminger has his work cut out for him, to put it mildly. He will soon be responsible for keeping Las Vegas and its associated sprawl from drying up and evaporating back into the desert. Current Southern Nevada Water Authority director Pat Mulroy, notorious throughout the West for her water-grabbing ways, hand-picked Entsminger to be […]
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Final EPA report is the latest in a series of blows to Alaska’s Pebble Mine
Last summer, the excavation of some of the world’s richest mineral deposits – and the degradation of some of the world’s richest salmon habitat – seemed well within the grasp of global mining interests. But with the release of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s long-awaited environmental assessment on Jan. 15, the development of Pebble Mine […]
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From bison to birds, the National Park Service rethinks its approach to migratory species
Imagine, if you will, that you’re a Kittlitz’s Murrelet – a tiny seabird, feathered in salt-and-pepper. It’s summer, or what passes for summer in a field of Alaskan glaciers, and you’re relaxing in the lap of luxury: Kenai Fjords National Park, where nobody can shoot you, set their dog after you, or lay a finger […]
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Dust-on-snow update: 2013 moisture could mean a dusty spring
Dust has become a major concern for climatologists – and anyone who drinks water that comes from mountain runoff – in recent years. Yet while dust storms are cropping up in the eastern parts of the state this winter, the Colorado Dust-on-Snow Program (CODOS) on the Western Slope has yet to report any dust-on-snow events […]
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Ocean acidification is already driving changes in Northwestern marine ecology
For a time, Pseudolithophyllum muricatum was king of the kelp forest understory around Tatoosh Island, a rocky blip of land off the northwestern tip of the Olympic Peninsula. In experimental “bouts” staged there by famed ecologist Bob Paine that pitted the crusty, milky red algae against other species of coralline algae it lived amongst, P. muricatum […]
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Bakken oil trucks can kick up carcinogenic dust similar to asbestos
Since the oil boom in western North Dakota began several years ago, the roads in this sparsely-populated corner of the state have been taking a beating. A typical shale oil well requires 2,300 truck trips in its lifetime, driven mostly over gravel roads. With nearly 6,800 wells currently operating in the Bakken oil field, that’s a […]
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New study maps carbon footprints, comes to surprising conclusions
One could lose oneself for hours in the patterns and erratic splotches of colors. Do I live in a swath of self-righteous green? Or in guilt-ridden, fiery orange? Does urban density really reduce our environmental impact? And how gluttonous are those McMansion-dwelling exurbanites, anyway? The answers to all these questions and more are now just […]
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Tale of two states: Utah’s a model for reducing homelessness, Wyoming lags behind
What happens when you give a homeless person a subsidized apartment? The answer isn’t as straightforward as you might think. But in Utah, it’s proven a resounding success – out of 17 chronically homeless people who took part in the state’s 2005 pilot program, all were still off the streets two years later, spurring a […]
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Hopi lawsuit against wastewater snowmaking gets green light in Arizona
The Arizona Supreme Court has greenlighted a lawsuit that the Hopi Tribe brought against the city of Flagstaff, Ariz. for selling wastewater to a local ski resort to make fake snow. In a procedural victory, the tribe has won the right to proceed with its lawsuit challenging Flagstaff’s 2002 decision to sell reclaimed wastewater to […]
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If the gas industry wants enviro cred, it should embrace methane regulation
Shift more of the nation off coal-powered electricity and onto that supplied by natural gas, and what do you get? A significant reduction in the carbon emissions driving the alarming climatic shifts we already experience in our daily lives. That’s the theory anyway, based on the fact that natural gas produces about half the carbon […]