Our Northwest Energy

Is Sprawl Good?

You may think you know all there about sprawl but author and historian Robert Bruegmann says that sprawl isn't an American phenomenon, and he challenges the idea that sprawl is bad. He has written a book called Sprawl A Compact History. Professor Bruegmann will be speaking at Washington State Univeristy Tuesday, March 23rd at 7pm in Carpenter Hall. We asked him about his presentation titled, "“Sprawl: Taking a Second Look."

RobertBruegmann

You can hear more from Professor Bruegmann Tuesday at the Pullman WSU campus. For more information visit our arts calender or click Sprawl: Taking a Second Look

Senator Patty Murray Questions Energy Secretary Steven Chu

Democratic Senator Patty Murray had tough words [today] Thursday for federal Secretary of Energy Steven Chu. She's angry over the decision by the Obama Administration to take Nevada's Yucca Mountain off the table as a possible nuclear waste storage site. Murray says that decision could push back cleanup at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in southeast Washington. Or she says it could mean Hanford becomes a permanent storage site for dangerous nuclear waste.

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Eugene Residents Weigh in on Hanford Clean Up

The US Department of Energy is planning how and to what extent to clean up Hanford's leaking storage tanks, treat radioactive waste and deal with a contaminated reactor. The current preferred alternatives don't call for a full clean up of the site.

Twenty community members testified. Many, like Marilyn Cohen, also spoke out against having any further waste shipped to Hanford for storage and processing.

“If you can't clean up what you you've got and it's going to be leaching into the water for the next 10,000, 20,000 years, what are we talking about as Americans about putting more into the soil.”

The crowd also voice concerns about the potential for transporting that waste along the highly populated I-5 corridor through Eugene and Springfield. The earliest that could happen is 2022, when a moratorium on further shipments expires.

The DOE cites costs, technological limitations and worker safety as reasons for not doing a complete clean up. [The final public hearing will be held on March 8th in Seattle.]

European Experience Provides Example and Cautions

HAMBURG, Germany – It's no accident that roughly half of the world's installed solar panels aim at the sky in this relatively cloudy, northern country. Investors in German solar power arrays, wind farms and methane digesters can count on significantly higher rates-of-return than alternative investments such as bonds or savings accounts.

New Way To Promote Green Energy Would Show Up On Electric Bills

OLYMPIA, Wash. -- Millions of Northwest electricity customers have the option to pay a little bit extra on their monthly bills to support “green energy.” In the coming years, that voluntary option could take a back seat to a mandatory, but invisible charge on electric bills. Policymakers along the West Coast are working on a new green energy incentive. It relies not on tax dollars, as is traditional, but rather on ratepayer dollars. Correspondent Tom Banse reports on how it would work.

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Putting A Lot Of Energy Into Energy Conservation

SPOKANE, WA – Cold weather requires a lot of adjustments. Close the windows. Get out the sweaters. Nestle into the warm socks. Many of these are aimed at keeping the electricity bill from going through the ceiling. Northwest utilities are paying out a lot of money to get their customers to use less power as winter weather sets in. So far, electricity companies say their conservation efforts are paying off.

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New Idaho Coal Gasification Plant To Emit Less Carbon Dioxide

COEUR D’ALENE, ID - Conservationists are touting a proposed fertilizer plant near American Falls, Idaho as a national model. A Pennsylvania energy company has agreed to significantly reduce carbon monoxide emissions from the coal-powered facility. The state has responded with an air quality permit.

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Al Gore Predicts No Treaty from Copenhagen

SEATTLE, WA - Former Vice-President Al Gore says nuclear power and clean coal may have role in the world's energy future, but a limited one. Gore was in Seattle yesterday to promote his latest book.One problem with nuclear power he says, is that it could lede to more nuclear weapons.

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Beyond Yucca: Experts Question Hanford’s Waste Treatment Plant, Now That Yucca Mountain Is Not An Option

RICHLAND, Wash. - The Obama Administration says it plans to appoint a blue ribbon panel soon to determine the fate of the nation's radioactive waste. For years now the waste at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation has been destined for a deep hole in Nevada's Yucca Mountain. But as he promised in his campaign, President Obama stripped funding for Yucca. Now, Hanford officials are wondering where all the high-level waste in Washington State will go. Richland Correspondent Anna King reports.

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Mining Company Told No Digging Near WA Highway 410 Landslide

Washington's Department of Natural Resources has issued an emergency order blocking rock mining near a huge landslide. The slide last month took out two homes and blocked Highway 410 west of Yakima. The agency acted after it heard that a mining company planned to resume business.

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