A controversial clean water permit for a coal mine complex sited at a Navajo and Hopi sacred mountain is once again up for review by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Peabody Western Coal Company seeks a renewal of its water quality permit for the Black Mesa/ Kayenta Mine Complex, despite the mine’s impact on […]
Energy & Industry
Posted inBlog
An age-old story of the high cost of coal
The news from Appalachia coal country, where at least 25 miners died and four more remain missing in a huge underground coalmine explosion earlier this week, is unimaginably grim. Not since 1984, when 27 perished in a fire at Emery Mining Corporation’s Orangeville, Utah, mine have so many died in a mine accident. It’s even […]
Posted inGoat
Not so CX-y now
A 2008 lawsuit filed to protect Utah petroglyphs from oil and gas drilling has just been resolved — and the settlement has big implications for the West’s public lands. Announced Wednesday, the decision means that the Bureau of Land Management can no longer fast-track energy development in cases where there are “extraordinary circumstances” — environmental, […]
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Frack-O-Rama
It’s been a hot week in the tug-of-war over how – or whether – the government will regulate hydraulic fracturing (or “fracking”), the drilling method used to extract oil and natural gas, with almost daily headlines coming out of the EPA, Wyoming and Congress. First, the big news: last Thursday, the EPA finally announced it […]
Posted inGoat
All aboard the coal train
Very little is certain for ol’ King Coal these days. The numbers weren’t pretty last year. Coal production was down almost 8 percent in 2009, and consumption fell even further. Environmentalists are still fighting new coal-fired power plants tooth and nail—and winning. And the future of federal carbon regulation, which could have major implications for […]
Posted inGoat
This’ll buoy your day
A bevy of bright-yellow buoys may soon bob off the coast of Reedsport, Oreg. With each rise and fall of an ocean swell, the flotilla of giant, robotic, $4 million duckies will generate electrons to power TVs and industries. The electricity will travel to an underwater substation, then by cable to shore. What impact will […]
Posted inGoat
Thumbs up for Wyo’s wind tax
Wyoming has some of the world’s best winds for generating power. And wind energy developers salivate over all those big, wide-open, unpeopled spaces. It’s no surprise then that turbines have been sprouting in those spaces at a rapid rate over the past year or so, upping the state’s total wind generating capacity by more than […]
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Mules making a comeback
The mule, a sterile cross between a jackass and a mare, is a creature “without pride of ancestry nor hope of posterity.” And it’s also the subject of an article in the current edition (Feb. 15-22) of The New Yorker. The full text is available only to subscribers, although an abstract is available […]
Posted inRange
Booms, Busts, and B.S.
I’d have to look at 60+ years of calendars, but suffice it to say this Grand Junction native has lived through his share of hometown booms and busts. Off the top of my head, there’ve been a couple of uranium booms and the oil shale boom that infamously ended with a Black Sunday in May […]
Posted inFebruary 15, 2010: Prodigal Dogs
Cross(border) winds
California looks to Mexico for renewable energy projects
Posted inRange
Native Farmers and Ranchers
In my last post, I reported some of the results of the USDA’s 2008 Farm and Ranch Irrigation Survey which is part of the 2007 Census of Agriculture. The 2007 Census has given us the first good data on Native American farmers. That’s because in prior surveys the USDA treated reservations as if they were […]
Posted inArticles
The Forgotten Mesa
Without basic services, life on Pajarito Mesa is all about surviving.
Posted inGoat
Beanstalk 2013
WANTED: thrill-seeking gardeners with a love of heights. Experience washing skyscraper windows a plus. Such an ad might appear in Portland, Oreg., by 2013. Thanks to government stimulus funds, the city’s main federal building will be renovated with giant plant-bearing trellises down its western side. These “vegetated fins” will shade the building in summer and […]
Posted inGoat
Green energy isn’t always popular
My part of the world gets way too much wind along with plenty of sunshine. It also has some unusual geology which allows the earth’s inner heat to come closer to the surface. Our wind, despite the window-rattling power of its gusts, is too sporadic to attract much commercial interest in developing this […]
Posted inGoat
Is this the nuclear renaissance?
It’s been a big week for nuclear power. First there was the conspicuous nuclear shout-out in the State of the Union last Wednesday, followed by the White House announcement, on Friday, that the Energy Department will explore new solutions for coping with nuclear waste. Then, yesterday, the administration released its budget proposal, with a plan […]
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Cows vs. RATs
The Forest Service and the BLM have just announced the 2010 fee for grazing one cow and calf on public land. Back in 1966, the fee was $1.23 per month. For comparison, here are the prices of some common items in 1966 and today: Item In 1966 Today New car $2,650 $23,000 Gallon […]
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The costs of coal
A controversial new report on the economics of Powder River Basin coal was written by a University of Wyoming economist — and paid for by the Wyoming Mining Association. As you might expect, the report provides some boosterish facts about coal:
Posted inGoat
Frackin’ Fears
Yet another group is demanding that the federal government regulate hydraulic fracturing (or “fracking”), the process used to extract oil and natural gas, because it threatens human health. In a report released yesterday, Drilling Around the Law, the Environmental Working Group (EWG) argues that fracking could contaminate drinking water supplies “from Pennsylvania to Wyoming,” but […]