Climate Justice Forum: Idaho Gas Facility Emissions, Wildfire Relief, Nuclear Waste, Washington Totem Pole Blessings & Refinery Rules, Fukushima Release, Climate Marches, Line 3 Trials, & More 8-30-23

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The Wednesday, August 30, 2023, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features news, music, and reflections on unaddressed toxic emissions from southwest Idaho gas facilities, the one-year anniversary of suspended wetland damage permits for an Idaho highway expansion, a Spokane totem pole journey stop and blessing honoring Leonard Peltier, north Idaho rain relief from regional wildfires and a filed objection to a winter recreation vehicle forest plan, eastern Idaho meetings on potential nuclear waste storage, coastal dangers and Seattle protests of Japan release of Fukushima radioactive waste into the Pacific Ocean, Washington rules to protect refinery workers and communities, New York City and nationwide climate marches to end fossil fuels, and a proposed sulfide mine and water protector trials around the Minnesota Line 3 tar sands pipeline.  Broadcast for eleven years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuel projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading →

Climate Justice Forum: Delayed Idaho Highway & Pipeline Expansions, Washington Wildfires, Forced Coal Trains, Oregon Rail Yard, Montana Solar Project, Nevada Mine & Alaska LNG Lawsuits 8-23-23

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The Wednesday, August 23, 2023, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features news, music, and reflections on Idaho highway construction delayed by deficient state permit applications, swiftly large wildfires, evacuations, and states of emergency in eastern Washington and north Idaho near a federally postponed gas pipeline expansion, regulator rejection of a railroad request to stop forced coal transportation, a refiled Oregon biofuel refinery rail yard application, a newly operational solar power project in Montana, and lawsuits challenging Nevada lithium mining cases against water protectors and denouncing Alaska LNG export approval.  Broadcast for eleven years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuel projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading →

Climate Justice Forum: Nez Perce Megaloads, Idaho Rail Expansion, Gas Line Rupture, River Exposure, & Nearby Fire, Oregon & Appalachian Pipeline Opposition, Montana Youth Climate Win 8-16-23

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The Wednesday, August 16, 2023, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features news, videos, and reflections on the tenth anniversary of Nimiipuu (Nez Perce) blockades of tar sands megaloads in their Idaho reservation and wildlands, an Idaho women’s symposium on legislative threats to reproductive health, BNSF Railway completion and traffic on its two-way, double tracks and second bridges on Lake Pend Oreille, a north Idaho gas pipeline rupture and reburied exposure under a river, wildfires and evacuations in small cities, near a gas compressor station planned for expansion, and within a massive, litigated, proposed logging project in lakeside mountains, Oregon opposition to Northwest gas pipeline expansion, protests and arrests at a Washington nuclear submarine base and Appalachian pipeline work site, and federal court decisions denying attorney fee recovery to Idaho gas well drilling proponents and affirming Montana youth constitutional rights to state climate action.  Broadcast for eleven years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuel projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading →

Climate Justice Forum: Northwest Gas Pipeline Hearing, Hanford Site, Japan Atomic Bombs, Nuclear Energy Pollution, North Idaho Doubled Rail Lines, Lake Herbicides, & Logging Area Wildfire 8-9-23

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The Wednesday, August 9, 2023, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features speakers at the February 13 People’s Hearing to Stop GTN Xpress, hosted by a Northwest coalition to gather testimony from community members threatened by Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) pipeline expansion.  We also share news, videos, and reflections on the dangerously leaking Hanford nuclear weapon production site in Washington, the 78th anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombing of Japan and the deadly legacy of Oppenheimer and nuclear energy for indigenous peoples, BNSF Railway completion of its north Idaho double tracks and second bridges, federal and state agency application of toxic herbicides in Lake Pend Oreille, and a wildfire in a massive, litigated, logging project in lakeside mountains.  Broadcast for eleven years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuel projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading →

Climate Justice Forum: Idaho Tribal Paddle, Train Collision, & Wind Energy, Delayed Northwest, Fiery Virginia, & Protested Gas Pipelines, Montana Bridge Derailment, Atlanta Cop Training Loans 8-2-23

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The Wednesday, August 2, 2023, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features news, music, and reflections on the seventh annual Kalispel and allied tribal canoe journey, successful delay of a federal decision on an unsafe Northwest pipeline expansion after a fiery Virginia gas line explosion and public and political pressure, calls to frontline defense camps opposing Appalachia and British Columbia gas pipeline construction, actions dissuading bank loans for an Atlanta cop training facility, a deadly north Idaho train and vehicle collision, widespread downstream fossil fuels contamination from a Yellowstone River bridge derailment, spike sabotaged North Carolina railroad tracks, Congressional spending bill obstacles to Idaho wind energy, August blue super moons, and Irish uprising ballads.  Broadcast for eleven years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuel projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading →

2023 Remember the Water Kalispel Powwow Paddle

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20220804_100322On Monday, July 31, through Friday, August 4, Kalispel and regional tribal members and the River Warrior Society are holding the annual Remember the Water Kalispel Powwow canoe journey [1, 2].  The paddle usually voyages from Lake Pend Oreille and Qpqpe (Sandpoint), Idaho, to the Qlispe (Kalispel) Village in Cusick, Washington, during the week before the yearly Kalispel Powwow and around the time of the Festival at Sandpoint music concerts.  In this cultural journey, families and friends are again paddling in traditional, dugout, wooden and sturgeon nose canoes, like their ancestors did for travel, fishing, and fun, over 50 miles through their home lands and waters among the tributaries, lake, and river of the Pend Oreille watershed.

While oil and gas pipeline expansions and fossil fuels pipeline-on-rails infrastructure and transportation impose and risk further harms to indigenous people and places locally and across Turtle Island (North America), Native neighbors continue to revive, uphold, and practice their ancient cultures and sustainable ways, through admirable endeavors like this canoe journey and culminating powwow.  Paddle organizers invite and encourage tribal allies and everyone to join in this joyful resurgence at various route locations, as they accommodate as many participants and observers as they can.

The canoe journey tentatively begins on Monday, July 31, with setting up camp at Sam Owen Campground off Hope Peninsula Road near Hope, Idaho, before paddling to the Bear Paw petroglyphs and back.  On Tuesday, August 1, participants plan to put in, paddle, and take out on the Pack River, and later stay at Sam Owen or the Best Western Edgewater Resort in Sandpoint.  Like during previous years, and as depicted in linked photos and articles about prior journeys, Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT) activists and area groups intend to welcome the paddlers at Sandpoint, during their arrival and/or departure on Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, August 1 and 2 [2]. Continue reading →

Climate Justice Forum: Northwest Pipeline Expansion State Law Conflicts, People’s Hearing, & Approval Protests, TC Energy Virginia Gas Pipeline Explosion, Mountain Valley Pipeline Resistance 7-26-23

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The Wednesday, July 26, 2023, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features speakers at the February 13 People’s Hearing to Stop GTN Xpress, hosted by a Northwest coalition to gather testimony from community members threatened by Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) pipeline expansion.  We also share news and reflections on a TC Energy pipeline explosion and fire in Virginia, GTN Xpress contradictions with West Coast state emissions reduction laws, and actions in Portland and Washington, D.C. opposing July 27 GTN Xpress approval and protesting corroded Mountain Valley pipeline construction.  Broadcast for eleven years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuel projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading →

Urgent July 26 & 27 GTN Xpress Pipeline Actions

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Portland GTN Xpress Protest

BXE GTN Xpress Phone Email BlastWHAT THE FERC?!

On Thursday, July 20, a Northwest coalition of groups working to stop the Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) Xpress pipeline expansion learned that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) listed GTN Xpress on its certificate agenda for its monthly meeting on Thursday, July 27.  In an apparent, massive, rubberstamp attempt to rush approvals before FERC’s August non-meeting break, the federal agency will likely permit a slew of fossil fuels projects including the GTN Xpress application of TC Energy, owner of the rupturing Keystone and rejected Keystone XL tar sands pipelines.  Along with thousands of Northwest citizens and dozens of organizations, the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission and West Coast governors, state attorneys general and legislators, and U.S. senators have opposed and organized against GTN Xpress for almost two years.

GTN Xpress is essentially a fossil fuels invasion of southern Idaho, thankfully challenged by neighboring states and Sandpoint and Spokane fossil fuels sacrifice zones that would receive only 13 percent or none of additional GTN gas.  More than half of the 150 million cubic feet per day of extra, unnecessary, fracked gas that TC Energy plans to push with three upgraded compressors through the 60-year-plus GTN pipeline would threaten the health and safety of north Idaho and eastern Washington pipeline corridor residents, for delivery to southern Idaho.  GTN and Intermountain Gas of Boise, who requested gas customer price hikes last winter, intend to essentially take over and reverse westward Williams Northwest pipeline flows, to bolster their profits at the 30-year expense of utility ratepayers increasingly favoring alternative energy.

WIRT is exploring the GTN Xpress record for information about probably missing Williams agreements and to produce second WIRT comments before July 27, welcoming other, also issue-underrepresented, Idaho and inland Northwest groups and residents to send your remarks to FERC.  Despite postponed railroad double-track construction impeding public transportation and requiring citizen monitoring at the Sandpoint Amtrak station, we will next coordinate regional protests in Athol (site of one of three compressor expansions), Sandpoint, Spokane, Moscow, and Boise, denouncing GTN’s proposal and FERC’s predictable decision, while supporting FERC re-hearing petitions filed by coalition partners and hopefully Northwest states, before the August 26 challenge deadline.  We appreciate your interest in GTN Xpress resistance and your input toward comments and demonstrations that demand FERC justice from the ongoing dangers and compounded risks of GTN Xpress expansion, leaks, and resulting climate disasters.

ANOTHER TC ENERGY PIPELINE RUPTURE

On July 25, the TC Energy-owned Columbia Gas Transmission pipeline catastrophically failed, causing a large explosion and fire and temporarily closing Interstate 81 in rural Shenandoah County, Virginia, approximately 80 miles west of Washington, D.C. [1, 2].  Thankfully, the incident neither injured nor killed anyone, and its causes and impacts remain unknown.  But like the December 2022 rupture and 600,000-gallon spill from TC Energy’s Keystone tar sands pipeline into a Kansas stream only weeks after FERC release of the GTN Xpress final environmental impact statement (EIS), the Virginia disaster demonstrates the terrible safety record of TC Energy and timely illustrates the major risks posed by TC Energy’s GTN Xpress, less than 48 hours before FERC could approve this expansion scheme [3].  The proposal would increase flammable, climate-wrecking, methane gas flows through a six-decade-old pipeline among fire-prone rural lands and urban residential areas in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon.  As multiple wildfires burn and blanket the Northwest with smoke, a pipeline accident like the one that just occurred in Shenandoah County could devastate nearby communities. Continue reading →

Climate Justice Forum: NW Pipeline Expansion & First Nation Rights Hearings, Boise Emissions Reductions, SW Heat Dome, Railroad Hazmat Info, Smaller Crews, & BC Fire Aftermath 7-19-23

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The Wednesday, July 19, 2023, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features some lead speakers at the February 13 People’s Hearing to Stop GTN Xpress, hosted by a Northwest coalition to gather testimony from community members threatened by Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) pipeline expansion.  We also share news, interviews, and reflections on Boise, Idaho, goals for reduced carbon emissions, a weeks-long, southern U.S., climate crisis heat dome, a Union Pacific Railroad push for one-person crews with support trucks, a proposed federal rule requiring hazmat information provision to fire and first responders, delayed town reconstruction, lawsuits, and unreleased reports on a suspected train-caused, British Columbia wildfire, and Canadian government failure to respond to First Nation claims of human rights violations.  Broadcast for eleven years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuel projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading →

Climate Justice Forum: Idaho Highway 95 Construction, Oil Train Actions, & Railroad Pollution & Amtrak Disruption, Halted Mountain Valley Pipeline, Hottest Temperatures, 1960s Climate Change Denial 7-12-23

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The Wednesday, July 12, 2023, Climate Justice Forum radio program, produced by regional, climate activists collective Wild Idaho Rising Tide (WIRT), features news, music, and reflections on current and contested Highway 95 construction on Paradise Ridge, recent Stop Oil Trains actions and workshop information, and possible BNSF railroad expansion release of lead into Lake Pend Oreille and obstruction of Amtrak passenger train stops in north Idaho, protests and an appeals court order temporarily halting Mountain Valley pipeline installation, historically highest global temperatures in early July, and decades of disinformation and denial of climate scientists’ warnings by oil and gas companies and the U.S. government.  Broadcast for eleven years on progressive, volunteer, community station KRFP Radio Free Moscow, every Wednesday between 1:30 and 3 pm Pacific time, on-air at 90.3 FM and online, the show describes continent-wide, grassroots, frontline resistance to fossil fuel projects, the root causes of climate change, thanks to generous, anonymous listeners who adopted program host Helen Yost as their KRFP DJ. Continue reading →