Activists Hold Coal Train Teach-In in Helena between 17:05 and 11:29 on the Monday, August 20, KRFP Radio Free Moscow Evening Report, Crew Left Fatal Fire
Activists Hold Coal Train Teach-in in Helena
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Category Archives: Issues
Coal Export Action 8-18-12
Thanks to the amazing work of Blue Skies Campaign and hundreds of our fellow climate activists from 16 U.S. states and two Canadian provinces, the August 12 to 18 and 20 Coal Export Action raised awareness and staged multiple actions against coal extraction and export in Montana and across the Northwest. Wild Idaho Rising Tide participated in a Helena Farmers Market demonstration, Montana Capitol teach-in and group photos, and Montana Rail Link coal train rally and photos on Saturday, August 18. But this is only the beginning, King Coal…
(All photos by Steve Liptay except the first by Helen Yost)
Top Federal Official to Visit Port of Lewiston Next Week
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood will present grant
A top-level White House official will be visiting the Port of Lewiston Wednesday with Idaho’s governor.
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood is scheduled to appear at 1:30 p.m. at 1626 Sixth Avenue North in Lewiston, according to the governor’s office. He’ll be accompanied by Idaho Governor C.L. (Butch) Otter, Senator Mike Crapo, and Senator Jim Risch, both R-Idaho.
LaHood is a member of the Cabinet who advises the president. The men will be presenting a federal grant to the Port of Lewiston, according to the governor’s office.
The port received $1.3 million in June to expand its dock from the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery Discretionary Grant program. It’s not clear if the award that will be given Wednesday is the same. Continue reading
U.S. Representative Peter DeFazio of Oregon Not Likely to Oppose Coal Exports
U.S. Representative Peter DeFazio of Oregon Not Likely to Oppose Coal Exports between 30:08 and 29:00 on the Friday, August 17, KRFP Radio Free Moscow Evening Report, More Cove-Mallard
Helena Coal Protests
Coal Export Action between 21:07 and 20:12 on the Tuesday, August 14, KRFP Radio Free Moscow Evening Report, Dynamic Ad Signs, and Arch Coal Applies to Extract 1.5 Billion Tons of Powder River Coal between 14:52 and 11:57 on the Thursday, August 16, KRFP Radio Free Moscow Evening Report, Helena Coal Protests
Seismic Exploration for Oil and Natural Gas in Idaho
Looming frackers of southern Idaho described their seismic exploration for oil and natural gas over the next three months near Payette at a Wednesday, July 25, informational meeting:
Oil and Gas Exploration Meeting Set for Payette
Payette County Seismic Testing to Begin Soon
Gas Exploration Comes to Gem County
(From WIRT Newsletter)
Port of Lewiston Wins Dock-Expansion Grant
Meanwhile, Port of Whitman loses bid for money to replace railroad bridges
The region’s barging system, not rail, was a winner in a federal grant program that will provide $1.3 million for the Port of Lewiston to expand its dock.
The $2.9 million dock extension was the only Idaho project to be awarded money from the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) Discretionary Grant program.
The port estimates the project will create 48 jobs by 2023, assuming the annual number of containers the port handles grows from the 3,653 it handled last year to 16,000. Continue reading
Montana Closes Book on Plan to Roll Mega-Loads Across U.S. 12
The two-year battle between residents who live along U.S. Highway 12 and ExxonMobil’s mega-loads is formally over.
“We’re gratified that the industrialization of the beautiful Lochsa-Clearwater U.S. 12 corrdior has, for now, been stopped,” wrote Borg Hendrickson to Citydesk. “And that the Imperial Oil/ExxonMobil threat to north-central Idaho’s outdoor recreation paradise and its single growing industry, tourism, has been removed.”
It was July 2010 when BW first told you about something called “mega-loads” – hundreds of giant rigs of oil equipment that ExxonMobil wanted to crawl across U.S. 12, before heading north to the oil-rich tar sands of Alberta, Canada.
Read more: Montana Closes Book on Plan to Roll Mega-Loads Across U.S. 12
(By George Prentice, Boise Weekly)
Lewiston Port Approves Dock Expansion Spending
Budget includes $2.9 million for container dock project
The biggest item in a budget Lewiston port commissioners passed Wednesday is a $2.9 million container dock expansion.
The action came just minutes after David Doeringsfeld, the port’s manager, described the port’s primary mission as job creation and retention, not getting barges up and down the river.
More than doubling the length of the 125-foot dock is consistent with that goal, Doeringfeld said after the meeting. Continue reading
Megawoes on Megaloads
A scene from the documentary film Tipping Point: The Age of the Oil Sands
Idaho activists try to fire-up public over trafficking of tar-sands equipment
In the opening scenes of the documentary Tipping Point: The Age of the Oil Sands, a helicopter glides over Alberta’s Athabasca River. Wending through a boreal forest the size of Greece, the river and its attendant countryside is as rugged and beautiful as any in the world. Then, over a rise, gargantuan smokestacks suddenly spear the sky, lording over a landscape that can only be described as apocalyptic: the single largest source of CO2 emissions in North America.
These are the oil sands, a geological formation in which vast quantities of bitumen lie just below the earth’s crust — the largest proven reserves of oil in the world.
More than 1,000 miles to the south, cities like Moscow and Coeur d’Alene, along the I-90 and U.S. 95 corridors, are front and center in the development’s debate.
Read more: Megawoes on Megaloads
(By Zach Hagadone, Boise Weekly)
Wild Idaho Rising Tide 