As a new boom in coalbed methane gas drilling hits the
West, some counties are taking on industry-friendly state
regulating agencies and demanding that gas companies listen to
local concerns.
Also in this
issue: EPA chief Christie Whitman and Idaho Sen. Larry
Craig dipped champagne glasses in Idaho’s Lake Coeur d’Alene and
toasted the newly-created commission tasked with cleaning up mining
waste in the lake. But the Coeur d’Alene Tribe wants the problem to
be taken seriously.
Backlash
Local governments tackle an in-your-face rush on coalbed methane
The fission of a New Mexican nuclear family
In this richly layered novel, author Bradford Morrow peels back the geography of New Mexico to reveal its unforgiving core of rock and scree. The Land of Enchantment is also a landscape haunted by nuclear testing during the 1950s, and it is within this rough physical and emotional terrain that Morrow sets his tale about…
Is it possible …
It is possible for a ranch to maintain a healthy ecosystem during a drought – and stay in business? Ranch expert Kirk Gadzia is leading an Outdoor Classroom on Rangleland Health at Jim and Joy Williams’ ranch near Quemando, N.M., Sept. 14-15. Gadzia, co-author of the National Academy of Sciences book Rangeland Health, believes watershed…
If you’re tired …
If you’re tired of gloomy environmental books, visit the Sopris Foundation’s Web site for its handbook, A Call to Action. Jammed into 32 entertaining pages is everything from Grist Magazine’s “Energy saving tips for the very lazy,” to energy expert Randy Udall’s cerebral link between a Joni Mitchell song and his thoughts on carbon dioxide.…
Visit awhile with Molly …
Visit awhile with Molly Ivins, sharp-tongued Texas columnist, on Sept. 21 at the Western Colorado Congress meeting in Grand Junction, Colo. Inspired by her book, You Got to Dance with Them What Brung You, her discussion will examine – with, inevitably, great sarcastic delivery – how campaign finance distorts the political process. Call the WCC…
Cross lawsuit is not petty
Dear HCN, Myles Traphagen, (HCN, 6/24/02:Cross lawsuit divisive, petty), commenting on a May 13 article, “Does desert cross cross the line?” characterizes as “frivolous” and “petty” the American Civil Liberties Union’s lawsuit whose object is to have a six-foot metal cross removed from its unlawful installation in California’s Mojave National Preserve: “In an age where…
Great Basin belongs to all of us
Dear HCN, Michelle Nijhuis was mistaken when she wrote that the recent transfer of some Death Valley National Park land to the Timbisha Shoshone “was the first time the Park Service had ever ceded land to a tribe” (HCN, 8/5/02:Another way to win back the land). In 1975, about one-third of Grand Canyon National Park’s…
Defenders defends wolves
Dear HCN, In response to Joy York’s letter to the editor, “Wolf killing hard to swallow” (HCN, 7/10/02:Wolf killing hard to swallow), we are stunned to see an accusation that Defenders of Wildlife is “in the business of killing wolves.” How that statement could possibly be made about an organization that has done so much…
The Latest Bounce
The Colorado Wildlife Commission has approved plans to release up to 180 more lynx in the state beginning this winter, but there’s a catch. A state spokesman says the Department of Natural Resources is negotiating with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to give the threatened cats less-protective “experimental, nonessential” status, citing concern “that putting…
Forest thinning urgent
Dear HCN, In the long run, many well-intentioned environmental groups, with their stubborn resistance to sound forest-management techniques, will do far more damage to our forests than the timber industry. Loggers often cut too many trees, but many environmentalists, in their resistance to cutting any trees, may bring about a total conflagration. I’m a nature…
An inspiring, devastating story
The Navajo grassroots environmental group Dine CARE has worked to protect forests, water and human health on the Navajo reservation for more than a decade (HCN, 10/31/94:’People of the Earth’ stress “natural laws’). When group founders Leroy Jackson and Adella Begaye first started fighting irresponsible logging on the reservation, they thought the battle would take…
Forward from the Pleistocene
Dear HCN, Thanks for the 13 May issue, with the discussion of how past changes in North American ecosystems affect decisions we now face in the West. You might say that those who forget prehistory are doomed to repeat it. The letters from Linda Driskill (HCN, 6/24/02:Review gives only one view) and Kali Kaliche (HCN,…
River’s end
The numbers are impressive: 25 million people depend on the Colorado River, which falls 14,000 feet in its 1,700-mile journey, and is home to 20 power plants, 10 major dams and 80 diversion channels. Over the past year, the humanities councils of seven Western states have worked together on Moving Waters: The Colorado River and…
Golden in drought denial
Dear HCN, The August 19th issue’s front-page photo of the Denver Water Department signboard imploring people to take action and conserve water reminded me that yes, we are having a drought here in Colorado. Well, there have been other clues as well, such as the scorched brown hillsides, a summer with almost no measurable rainfall,…
Telling it on the mountain
The mountains, for many of us, are a source of inspiration, adventure, work and play. But for a lot of the world, mountain life means extreme poverty and a rapidly declining quality of life. A disproportionately high number of the world’s hungry and chronically malnourished people live in mountain regions. The United Nations has declared…
No shoes, no problem
With bats in the attic, skunks and marmots under the floor, deer mice in the corners and cluster flies throughout the house, Kathleen Meyer may want to sleep on the deck, but at least she no longer has to shit in the woods. In Barefoot Hearted: A Wild Life Among Wildlife, Meyer, author of the…
A NIMBY and proud of it
At a recent hearing on natural gas drilling in my county, a rancher stood before our planning commission and said, “I support President Bush’s policies to make America energy independent, and I don’t want to be a NIMBY, but … ” He then went on to outline the catastrophic impacts gas drilling could have on…
Breaking all the rules
Breaking all the rules Here at High Country News, we have a loose rule that we avoid stories that happen too close to home. We figure we can be more objective about things that don’t fall – literally – into our backyard. And besides, the West is a big region. With this issue, we’re breaking…
Farewell to a great mountain photographer
You’ve probably seen his work in National Geographic or Audubon – or in High Country News – as well as in his photography books. Famed for a transcendental approach to capturing the natural world, Galen Rowell was also an accomplished mountaineer, who inspired and awed his audience with breathtaking, seemingly impossible photographs. Rowell and his…
EPA puts cleanup in local hands
COEUR D’ALENE, Idaho – It’s hard to imagine that an issue as sprawling and contentious as the effort to clean up a century of mining waste in the Coeur d’Alene River Basin could fit into a glass of water (HCN, 3/4/02: EPA wants to supersize Idaho Superfund site). But that’s the image that came walking…
One Colorado county takes a stand
Note: This is a sidebar to a main story headlined “Backlash.” HOTCHKISS, Colo. – “Not a drop of water runs off of this place,” says Steve Ela, looking out over his 112-acre orchard, where tiny sprinklers mist beneath a canopy of apple trees. The irrigation system that diverts ditch water to soak half the orchard…
Bush’s energy push meets unintended consequences
WASHINGTON, D.C. – As substances go, natural gas doesn’t have much substance. Oh, it’s real enough. Mishandled, it can explode. Properly handled, it can heat homes, power vehicles and generate electricity. But being a gas, it lacks solidity. Unless it is liquefied, you cannot see it, much less grasp it. Natural gas, then, is sort…
Closing the loop
The West’s fire problem helps Navajos return to their roots
Heard Around the West
Ten people now have what you might consider a mini-me ranch in Wyoming, thanks to eBay, the on-line auction house. They each bid $25 on July 15 to crowd onto one square foot of land on the Gauthier Ranch near Rawlins. The toehold on what the owner calls a “micro-acre” includes hunting privileges. Thousands of…
The other firefighters
DURANGO, Colo. – “One neighbor’s house and one cabin were destroyed near here,” says Todd Swanson, surveying the blackened area behind his house outside this bustling college town. “But the thinning kept the fire back from my place until the slurry bombers were able to come and put it out.” In April, as a prologue…
When nature calls, don’t follow your instincts
GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. (11,600′) – With the Middle Teton Glacier glistening on one side, the jagged West Face of the Grand Teton looming above on the other, and most of eastern Idaho spread out like a tablecloth far below, the Lower Saddle is a breathtaking place. But something else is taking my breath…