A reality check for California’s low-carbon fuel standard, By Catherine Reheis-Boyd, Capitol Weekly | 12/15/11
The key to success in any endeavor – business, personal or political – is the ability and willingness to adjust one’s plans and expectations as conditions change. Families and businesses in California have been painfully reminded of that reality as they struggle to survive the worst economic slump our state has seen since the Great Depression. Unfortunately, this lesson does not seem to have been noticed by the California Air Resources Board, at least not in the case of the agency’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS).......
Governor kicks off climate change conference with attack on deniers, By Dana Hull, San Jose Mercury News, 12/15/2011
Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown kicked off his climate conference Thursday with a blistering attack on libertarians, the Republican party and others who deny that climate change is happening, despite overwhelming scientific consensus that sea levels are rising and the earth is warming......
Environmental extremists vs. jobs, Fred Schott, Santa Maria Times | Thursday, December 15, 2011
Back in July, I wrote a column titled, “It’s jobs vs. taxes/regulations.” This commentary will show the effects environmental extremists have had and are having on our economy. A few examples are: They have fought to prevent, delay and have increased the costs of developing our natural resources such as water, oil, natural gas, coal, nuclear, hydroelectric and timber. They fought to pass legislation granting the federal government greater power by using the Endangered Species Act, the EPA, energy regulations, etc. In the Northwest, they used the “spotted owl” to shut down the forest industry, with a loss of millions of dollars and thousands of jobs.....
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service personnel made a presentation at the Board of Supervisors meeting Tuesday about the Northern Spotted Owl, Heather Jensen, National Park Service, Siskiyou Daily News, Dec 15, 2011
Yreka, Calif. — Changes to the Northern Spotted Owl Critical Habitat (CH) designation on federal lands are on the horizon – a process that county supervisor Michael Kobseff said “will probably be a bumpy ride.” U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) personnel made a presentation to the Siskiyou County Board of Supervisors at its regular meeting Tuesday regarding the proposed CH designation revision. USFWS Field Supervisor Erin Williams explained that the USFWS is under an order from the U.S. Tenth Circuit Court to revise the CH designation by November 2012. “This is only being proposed for federal lands,”?USFWS Forest Resources Branch Chief Brian Woodbridge said at the meeting. “No private lands are being considered.”.......
County asks for Feinstein’s help in Forest Service dispute, Dan McDonald, Plumas County News, 12/14/2011
The county has come to the aid of a Greenville logger in his battle against the Forest Service. The Plumas County Board of Supervisors sent a letter to Sen. Dianne Feinstein asking her to intervene in a dispute over a 2009 timber sale. Pew Forest Products owner Randy Pew said his company is on the verge of bankruptcy after a job he bid on failed to produce the amount of timber the Forest Service said it would. The Forest Service said it was ultimately Pew’s responsibility to estimate the amount of usable timber before he bid on the job. Supervisor Robert Meacher and Chairwoman Lori Simpson said they drafted the Nov. 22 letter with the hope that Feinstein would assign a staff member to assist Plumas County. ....
House clogs up Congress with polluter 'riders', Sacramento Bee Editorial, Published Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2011
Congress is pressing up against a deadline to pass a $900 billion omnibus spending bill, dubbed the "megabus" – or the government shuts down when current funding runs out on Friday. Congress also is pressing up on a deadline to extend the one-year payroll tax cut – or it expires on Dec. 31. The House Republican majority passed a version on this yesterday that is unacceptable to the president and the Senate Democratic majority. We're at this juncture, in large measure, because House Republicans, once again, are trying to attach "poison pill" policy riders to these must-pass spending bills......
Fish and Game Commission to rule on fish stocking changes, By Ed Zieralski, San Diego Union Tribune, Wednesday, December 14, 2011
With ocean fishing closures set for Southern California on Jan. 1 as required by the California Legislature’s Marine Life Protection Act, a freshwater version of that unfunded mandate for ocean fishing now threatens freshwater angling and the more-than-century-old tradition of stocking of fish in private waters. The difference is this one didn’t come from the Legislature. It came from Department of Fish and Game fisheries staff members....
As We See It: Saving the coast: Cemex deal provides new model for conservation, Santa Cruz Sentinel, Posted: 12/14/2011
For more than a century, Santa Cruz County's incomparable North Coast was home to a cement plant, which provided jobs and paid for services in the tiny hamlet of Davenport. As more and more of the North Coast was preserved from development, the juxtaposition of a historic industrial use and the coastal bluffs and adjacent forests might have seemed jarring. When the plant, owned by the multinational corporation Cemex, finally closed for good a year and a half ago, many environmentalists rejoiced that at last the vast tract owned by the company could be purchased by land preservation groups and set aside to return to its natural state......
Details emerge on deal struck in Durban on CDM offsets program, ClimateWire, December 13, 2011
UNITED NATIONS -- Tucked into the text of the U.N. climate pact emerging from Durban, South Africa, are technical provisions that will shape the future of carbon offsets under the Kyoto Protocol, through what's known as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). In a flurry of late-night work over the weekend, the process of carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) was approved as eligible for the first time, and changes were made to speed up the authorization of projects.....
Lungren, Feinstein spar over Hetch Hetchy Valley restoration, The congressman, who backs draining the Yosemite Park reservoir, seeks a federal inquiry into San Francisco's use of Hetch Hetchy water. Feinstein defends city, By Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times, December 13, 2011
A call for an investigation into how San Francisco gets and consumes its water has sparked a feud between two congressional leaders on opposite sides of the aisle over a proposal to restore Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park, dammed 85 years ago to supply the city with clean water. Rep. Dan Lungren (R-Gold River), has asked the Interior Department to determine whether the city's use of 190 million gallons of Tuolumne River water per day, without first exhausting local resources, violates a law requiring that it import no more water than is necessary to meet its municipal purposes.....
Forest Owners Applaud Supreme Court on Forest Roads Order, Court moves closer toward review of Ninth Circuit Reversal of 35-Year Clean Water Precedent, Sacramento Bee, Published Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2011
WASHINGTON, Dec. 13, 2011 David P. Tenny, President and CEO of the National Alliance of Forest Owners (NAFO) released the following statement, after the U.S. Supreme Court issued an order asking the Solicitor General for the views of the federal government on two petitions challenging the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals' ruling that forest roads are "point sources" requiring an industrial discharge permit under the Clean Water Act (CWA): "We applaud the Supreme Court for scrutinizing the Ninth Circuit's decision to disregard EPA's 35 years of success regulating forest management as a nonpoint source under Clean Water Act. The Court is hearing not only the voice of forest owners and managers across the country but also Attorneys General from 26 states who joined a brief supporting EPA's historic approach. The policy and legal importance of this case is clear.....
The Cellulosic Ethanol Debacle, Congress mandated purchase of 250 million gallons in 2011. Actual production: 6.6 million, Wall Street Journal, 12/13/2011
'We'll fund additional research in cutting-edge methods of producing ethanol, not just from corn but from wood chips and stalks or switch grass. Our goal is to make this new kind of ethanol practical and competitive within six years." George W. Bush, 2006 State of the Union address
Years before the Obama Administration dumped $70 billion into solar and wind energy and battery operated cars, and long before anyone heard of Solyndra, President Bush launched his own version of a green energy revolution. The future he saw was biofuels. In addition to showering billions of dollars on corn ethanol, Mr. Bush assured the nation that by 2012 cars and trucks could be powered by cellulosic fuels from switch grass and other plant life.....
On Battle Creek, the rules are working, Dan Tomascheski,Redding Record Searchlight, Monday, December 12, 2011
Positive environmental news is not easily found these days, but there's a success story right in our backyard. It's about the restoration of critical salmon habitat and the good-faith collaboration that is making it possible. Private landowners, government agencies, members of the environmental community, and others have come together to restore some 50 miles of freshwater streams in the Battle Creek watershed. The watershed flows from the flanks of Lassen Peak to the Sacramento River in Shasta and Tehama counties. The streams in the greater Battle Creek watershed were blocked to salmon and steelhead access in the early 1900s when dams were constructed to provide for flood control, irrigation, and power generation....
At heart of massive Davenport preservation deal, a paradox, By JASON HOPPIN, Santa Cruz Sentinel, 12/10/2011
DAVENPORT -- It seems backward that to save trees you need to cut some of them down, but a hard reality is making it so. A quintet of conservation groups announced this week a $30 million deal to preserve more than 8,500 pristine acres of forests above Davenport -- the largest privately owned tract of land in the county. But underpinning the deal is a plan to continue selectively harvesting the forest, an idea that may cause controversy in some circles......
Pot grows on public lands a 'national emergency',Thadeus Greenson, Eureka Times-Standard, 12/09/2011, North Coast Congressman Mike Thompson sees a national emergency unfolding on forested lands across the country.
”Our public and private lands across California, and throughout the country, are being held hostage by illegal drug growers,” Thompson said Wednesday, testifying before the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control. “In short, our public lands have been taken away from us. That is wrong and must be stopped.”
Fishers returned to area in Sierra after 100 years Peter Fimrite, San Francisco Chronicle, Friday, December 9, 2011
The furry, dark brown creatures hesitated at first and then shot out of their plywood cages and bounded into the forest near the hamlet of Stirling City. It was the latest triumph in a remarkable campaign to bring back a long-lost predator known as the Pacific fisher to the northern Sierra Nevada. The four stubby-legged mammals were released by California Department of Fish and Game biologists as part of an innovative effort to reintroduce the weasel family species to a region they were driven out of 100 years ago.
Previewing Legal Challenges to Cap-and-Trade, Robert Lawrence, Dustin Till and Svend Brandt-Erichsen, Marten Law Newsletter, November 22, 2011
California’s greenhouse gas (GHG) cap-and-trade program is due to be finalized within a few weeks, over widespread opposition and concern about its effects on California’s economy. Looking forward, California business and citizens groups are considering how and when to challenge the regulations in court. This article reviews some of the likely challenges and their strengths and limitations......