Environment Archives - Page 48 of 106

Climate Disruptions Hitting More and More Tribal Nations

Associated PressKivalina, Alaska is one of several Native villages that are compromised by rising waters. — Associated Press
Kivalina, Alaska is one of several Native villages that are compromised by rising waters.

Native Americans have long had a close relationship with their lands and waters—sacred places and resources that define their lives. The disruptions wrought by a warming climate are forcing abrupt cultural changes on peoples with a long reliance on a once stable ecosystem.

Among the special issues affecting tribes, the 2013 Assessment of Climate Change in the Southwestern United States (SWCA) cited “cultural and religious impacts, impacts to sustainable livelihoods, population emigration, and threats to the feasibility of living conditions.”

The Hoh, Quinault, Quileute and Makah nations inhabit low-lying land along the west coast of Washington State, and face similar threats as rising sea levels and the other impacts of climate disruptions endanger their villages.

”The area is relatively vulnerable,” Patty Glick, senior global warming specialist and author of a 2007 National Wildlife Federation report, ”Sea Level Rise and Coastal Habitats in the Pacific Northwest,” told Indian Country Today Media Network in 2008. Higher wave action, wave force and destructive storm surges will increase in the coming decade, Glick said, and destructive storms such as the hurricanes will become more frequent.

The Hoh road to the beach has washed out, and the ocean has destroyed the homes that once lined their beach. In Quinault, a passing storm tossed gigantic logs onto the school grounds. These events intensified both tribes’ agenda to get higher ground returned from the Olympic National Park beyond their tiny reservation boundaries.

The Makah and the Quinault nations have large reservations, but their seaside villages are at risk, as evidenced by the recent state of emergency at Quinault headquarters in Taholah, which faced an increasingly dangerous situation with sea level rise and intensified storms, which breached a sea wall causing serious damage.

According to Climate Central, which uses data from NOAA and the USGS, there is a greater than one in six chance that sea level rise, plus storm surge, plus tides, will raise sea levels by more than one foot before 2020 along the coastline and in the Puget Sound region, where another eight tribes are situated. The Shoalwater Bay sits nearly out to sea in southwest Washington.

Rising sea levels will affect Washington’s shoreline habitat for vegetation, animals, birds and fish, according to Glick’s report. Marshes, swamps and tidal flats will be significantly affected, and salmon and shellfish habitat are expected to be significantly affected, Glick reported.

Along Alaska’s northwestern coast, melting sea ice has reduced natural coastal protection. Increased coastal erosion is causing some shorelines to retreat at rates averaging tens of feet per year. In Shishmaref and Kivalina, Alaska, severe erosion has caused homes to collapse into the sea, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, forcing these Alaska Native Village populations to relocate in order to protect lives and property.

Moving inland, “Climate change is slowly tipping the balance in favor of more frequent, longer lasting, and more intense droughts,” states the SWCA. The Navajo Nation is experiencing annual average temperatures warmer than the 1904-2011 average, cites a climate report released in March 2014. Latest figures show their drought continuing beyond 2010 studies into July 2013, indicating the drought continues.

Perhaps among the worst of those impacts are the runaway sand dunes it has unleashed, which extend over one-third the 27,000-square-mile reservation. During the 1996-2009 drought period the extent of dune fields increased by some 70%. These dunes are moving at rates of approximately 35 meters per year, covering houses, burying cars and snarling traffic, degrading grazing and agricultural lands, contributing to the loss of rare and endangered native plants, and when they occur contributing to poor air quality, a serious health concern for many of the reservation’s 173,667 residents.

Intertribal organizations around the U.S. are recognizing climate change and variability as a significant factor that can impact tribal resources, livelihoods, and cultures, cites the latest tribal climate report. The National Tribal Air Association notes that “perhaps no other community of people has experienced the adverse impacts of climate change more than the nation’s Indian tribes.”

The struggle will soon come to more tribes. Sea level rise projections do not bode well and may already be a cause of concern for the tribes along Louisiana’s Gulf of Mexico—the United Houma Nation, the Atakapa-Ishak Nation, Pointe-au-Chien Tribe, and the Biloxi-Chitimacha’s Isle de Jean Charles Band, Grand Caillou/Dulac Band and Bayou Lafourche Band. In Florida—the Miccosukee, and some locations of the Seminole Indian Reservations. Ocean residing tribal nations in California include the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla, Cahto, Chumash, Hoopa, Karok, Kumeyaay, Luiseño Bands of Indians, Maidu, Miwok, and some bands of the Pomo Nation. Some are more at risk than others.

Inslee Predicts Washington Will Adopt Controversial Fuel Standard

File photo) Washington Gov. Jay Inslee looking at ways to enact a low-carbon fuel standard without legislative approval. | credit: TVW

Austin Jenkins, NW News Network

Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee says Washington will likely adopt a California-style pollution limit on gasoline and other transportation fuels.

Inslee recently ordered a feasibility and cost study of a low-carbon fuel standard.

For months now, Washington Republicans have been predicting that Inslee will use his executive powers to enact a low-carbon fuel standard. Inslee acknowledges he’s looking at ways to do this without legislative approval. Either way he thinks Washington is poised to move forward.

“I think it’s a probability that we will be able to fashion a low-carbon fuel standard that will be effective for the state of Washington, both for carbon pollution and from a cost-containment standpoint,” Inslee said during an appearance on Seattle Channel’s “Civic Cocktail” program. “From what I know today, I think it’s a likelihood we will succeed in fashioning that, but I want reiterate we’re going to have a very sophisticated, thorough evaluation of that before I make that ultimate decision.”

A low-carbon fuel standard is basically a requirement that vehicle fuels be blended with less carbon-intensive alternative fuels. For instance, California’s standard requires a 10 percent reduction in carbon intensity of gas and diesel over 10 years.

Inslee has promised a “deliberative, public process” as he pursues carbon pollution reduction measures in Washington. Legislative Republicans oppose a fuel standard and say it could drive up the cost of gasoline.

This was first reported for the Northwest News Network.

International Team Maps Nearly 200K Glaciers in Quest of Sea-Level Rise Estimates

University of Colorado-Boulder May 7, 2014.

An international team led by glaciologists from the University of Colorado Boulder and Trent University in Ontario, Canada has completed the first mapping of virtually all of the world’s glaciers — including their locations and sizes — allowing for calculations of their volumes and ongoing contributions to global sea rise as the world warms.

The team mapped and catalogued some 198,000 glaciers around the world as part of the massive Randolph Glacier Inventory, or RGI, to better understand rising seas over the coming decades as anthropogenic greenhouse gases heat the planet. Led by CU-Boulder Professor Tad Pfeffer and Trent University Professor Graham Cogley, the team included 74 scientists from 18 countries, most working on an unpaid, volunteer basis.

The project was undertaken in large part to provide the best information possible for the recently released Fifth Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC. While the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are both losing mass, it is the smaller glaciers that are contributing the most to rising seas now and that will continue to do so into the next century, said Pfeffer, a lead author on the new IPCC sea rise chapter and fellow at CU-Boulder’s Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research.

“I don’t think anyone could make meaningful progress on projecting glacier changes if the Randolph inventory was not available,” said Pfeffer, the first author on the RGI paper published online today in the Journal of Glaciology. Pfeffer said while funding for mountain glacier research has almost completely dried up in the United States in recent years with the exception of grants from NASA, there has been continuing funding by a number of European groups.

Since the world’s glaciers are expected to shrink drastically in the next century as the temperatures rise, the new RGI — named after one of the group’s meeting places in New Hampshire — is critical, said Pfeffer. In the RGI each individual glacier is represented by an accurate, computerized outline, making forecasts of glacier-climate interactions more precise.

“This means that people can now do research that they simply could not do before,” said Cogley, the corresponding author on the new Journal of Glaciology paper. “It’s now possible to conduct much more robust modeling for what might happen to these glaciers in the future.”

As part of the RGI effort, the team mapped intricate glacier complexes in places like Alaska, Patagonia, central Asia and the Himalayas, as well as the peripheral glaciers surrounding the two great ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica, said Pfeffer. “In order to model these glaciers, we have to know their individual characteristics, not simply an average or aggregate picture. That was one of the most difficult parts of the project.”

The team used satellite images and maps to outline the area and location of each glacier. The researchers can combine that information with a digital elevation model, then use a technique known as “power law scaling” to determine volumes of various collections of glaciers.

In addition to impacting global sea rise, the melting of the world’s glaciers over the next 100 years will severely affect regional water resources for uses like irrigation and hydropower, said Pfeffer. The melting also has implications for natural hazards like “glacier outburst” floods that may occur as the glaciers shrink, he said.

The total extent of glaciers in the RGI is roughly 280,000 square miles or 727,000 square kilometers — an area slightly larger than Texas or about the size of Germany, Denmark and Poland combined. The team estimated that the corresponding total volume of sea rise collectively held by the glaciers is 14 to 18 inches, or 350 to 470 millimeters.

The new estimates are less than some previous estimates, and in total they are less than 1 percent of the amount of water stored in the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, which collectively contain slightly more than 200 feet, or 63 meters, of sea rise.

“A lot of people think that the contribution of glaciers to sea rise is insignificant when compared with the big ice sheets,” said Pfeffer, also a professor in CU-Boulder’s civil, environmental and architectural engineering department. “But in the first several decades of the present century it is going to be this glacier reservoir that will be the primary contributor to sea rise. The real concern for city planners and coastal engineers will be in the coming decades, because 2100 is pretty far off to have to make meaningful decisions.”

Part of the RGI was based on the Global Land Ice Measurements from Space Initiative, or GLIMS, which involved more than 60 institutions from around the world and which contributed the baseline dataset for the RGI. Another important research data tool for the RGI was the European-funded program “Ice2Sea,” which brings together scientific and operational expertise from 24 leading institutions across Europe and beyond.

The GLIMS glacier database and website are maintained by CU-Boulder’s National Snow and Ice Data Center, or NSIDC. The GLIMS research team at NSIDC includes principal investigator Richard Armstrong, technical lead Bruce Raup and remote-sensing specialist Siri Jodha Singh Khalsa.

NSIDC is part of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, or CIRES, a joint venture between CU-Boulder and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

– See more at: http://www.colorado.edu/news/releases/2014/05/06/international-team-maps-nearly-200000-glaciers-quest-sea-level-rise#sthash.W6vK18yo.dpuf

Indian rights activists say treaties give them a say on pipeline route

Indian rights lawyers argue that a Sandpiper spill could endanger their rights to gather wild rice.

By David Shaffer, Star Tribune

In a new battlefront over energy policy, American Indian rights attorneys argued Wednesday before a Minnesota judge that historic treaties give tribes a say in where to build crude oil pipelines across land ceded by the Chippewa in the 19th century.

“Everybody has kind of forgotten what our rights are, and that is why we are here,” Frank Bibeau, an attorney for the Indian nonprofit group Honor the Earth, told an administrative law judge at a hearing in St. Paul.

Honor the Earth says the proposed $2.6 billion Sandpiper crude oil pipeline across northern Minnesota will produce “inevitable oil spills and environmental degradation” on ceded lands. Spills could endanger Rice Lake near McGregor and Sandy Lake in Aitkin County where Indians gather wild rice, the group says.

For the first time in Minnesota, Indian rights attorneys are arguing that the state Public Utilities Commission (PUC) lacks unilateral authority to approve pipelines. They want the state to reject the proposed route of the Sandpiper pipeline from North Dakota, and have offered an alternative path.

Enbridge Energy’s preferred pipeline route goes southeast from Clearbrook, Minn., passing west of Park Rapids and then heading east to Superior, Wis. It avoids Indian reservations, but passes through ceded lands on which Chippewa bands retain the right to fish, hunt and gather rice.

Attorneys for the company contend that the commission has no business deciding the meaning of federal treaties. Even so, much of the two-hour discussion before Judge Eric Lipman focused on 10 treaties signed between 1825 and 1864 by Minnesota Indian tribes.

“It would represent a dramatic departure from the commission’s precedent and would significantly impact not just pipeline projects but all large energy projects sited in northern Minnesota,” said Christine Brusven, an attorney for the Calgary-based pipeline company that’s proposing to build the 610-mile pipeline to carry North Dakota oil.

Headed for the courts?

Lipman, who is overseeing the regulatory review of the pipeline, is expected to rule on the treaty rights question, but the final decision rests with the Public Utilities Commission. The issue ultimately could land in federal court.

Before the hearing, about 45 Honor the Earth supporters, led by the group’s leader Winona LaDuke, demonstrated outside the PUC’s office.

Some Minnesota tribes have successfully asserted off-reservation rights under 19th century treaties. The U.S. Supreme Court in 1999 affirmed that the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa and seven other Chippewa bands retained hunting, fishing and gathering rights under an 1837 treaty on lands and lakes ceded by the tribes in central Minnesota, including Lake Mille Lacs.

Similar rights have been recognized under other treaties, and state and tribal governments share responsibility for game management in some ceded areas. This year, the Fond du Lac Band of Chippewa is exercising rights under an 1854 treaty to spear walleyes in several lakes in northeastern Minnesota’s Arrowhead region.

Honor the Earth attorneys contend that the 19th century treaties and early 20th century court rulings about wild rice reserves give the Ojibwe a present-day right to help make decisions affecting treaty-related resources.

“We are not saying we have an absolute veto,” Bibeau said in an interview.

Cooperation sought

Prof. Peter Erlinder of William Mitchell College of Law, who also represents Honor the Earth, said various treaties “need to be accommodated by state regulatory activities.” He said the state and tribes need to find a way to cooperate on pipeline siting.

But Enbridge attorney Randy Thompson, who represented Lake Mille Lacs landowners in the 1999 case, said Honor the Earth overstates the reach of the landmark decision.

“It is a nonexclusive right to hunt and fish,” Thompson said. “It gives bands the ability to self-regulate hunting and fishing by band members. It doesn’t give bands co-management authority. It doesn’t give the bands the ability to regulate nonmembers.”

Legal experts say protection of natural resources under 19th century Indian treaties is an emerging area of law.

“We have very little idea where it is going to go,” said James Coleman, an assistant professor of energy law at the University of Calgary and Haskayne School of Business.

In the state of Washington, a tribe with rights to fish for migrating salmon has successfully argued that the state Transportation Department must repair hundreds of culverts that block the passage of fish. Federal judges, most recently in 2013, have ruled that the barrier culverts violate treaty promises. Another federal judge in that state upheld in 1996 the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ right to deny a permit for a fish farm because it conflicted with the Lummi Nation’s treaty fishing rights.

Most treaty cases have been decided in federal court. Honor the Earth’s legal battle is unusual because it’s in a state regulatory proceeding. Bibeau said he reserves the right to take the case to tribal or federal court later.

Two precedents

In two previous Minnesota utility cases, tribes tried unsuccessfully to assert tribal authority over proposed pipelines or power lines. In 2011, the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe objected to a proposed transmission line that skirted tribal lands, but lost in federal court. The Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa objected to another pipeline in 2007. That project, like the transmission line, eventually won approval of the PUC.

Coleman, who grew up in the Twin Cities, said Indian activists face a difficult legal battle in the pipeline case. Unlike the Washington cases, he said, where judges saw actual harm to treaty-protected resources, the Minnesota concerns are about a potential situation, and depending on how bad the disaster was, maybe at some point it could eliminate those treaty rights.

McCoy named to nuclear energy task force

By Chris West

OLYMPIA – Sen. John McCoy, D-Tulalip, has been named to a new Joint Select Task Force on Nuclear Energy.

McCoy, the ranking member on the Senate Energy, Environment & Telecommunications Committee, will be one of eight legislators tasked with studying the viability of increased nuclear power production as a tool in reducing the state’s use of carbon-emitting fossil fuels.

“It’s crucial we take a close look at all potential renewable resources, including nuclear energy,” McCoy said. “At the same time, it’s also important that we gather all the facts and make informed decisions about our state’s clean energy future.”

The task force is expected to hold up to four meetings, including two in Richland. The task force is composed of equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats from the state House and Senate and will report their findings to the Legislature by Dec. 1.

Smith Island restoration project a huge win for water quality

Senator McCoy champions conservation project

Source: The Washington Wildlife and Recreation Coalition

People and salmon alike will benefit from a new project to protect Smith Island outside of Everett.

The Recreation and Conservation Office recently announced that the restoration of the Smith Island estuary would receive a grant from the Washington Wildlife and Recreation Program. This estuary is part of the Snohomish River system, which provides the second largest volume of freshwater entering Puget Sound from a single source.

“This project will provide immense benefits, restoring salmon habitat and protecting our water quality for the next generation,” said Senator John McCoy (D-Tulalip) . “The WWRP is a critical investment in our outdoors that is essential to preserving our quality of life.”

This single project represents nearly 5% of the entire Puget Sound Ecosystem Recovery estuary restoration target for 2020.

The local match combined with more than $15 million in federal and state grants from the Salmon Recovery Funding Board, the Recreation and Conservation Funding Board, and RCO brings the total funding amount to $16,001,958.

In addition to protecting water quality, the restoration of the Smith Island estuary will also provide new recreation access. Visitors will be able to witness wildlife in a rich tidal marsh habitat minutes from Everett’s urban core.

“Two thirds of WWRP projects protect or restore Puget Sound. This level of success would not be possible without dedicated legislators like Senator McCoy,” said Joanna Grist, executive director of the Washington Wildlife and Recreation Coalition. “Smith Island is a prime example of how we can increase access to the outdoors while preserving the purity of our natural treasures.”

Feds Issue Emergency Order On Crude Oil Trains

Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Transportation Department issued an emergency order Wednesday requiring that railroads inform state emergency management officials about the movement of large shipments of crude oil through their states and urged shippers not to use older model tanks cars that are easily ruptured in accidents, even at slow speeds.

The emergency order requires that each railroad operating trains containing more than 1 million gallons of crude oil — the equivalent of about 35 tank cars — from the booming Bakken region of North Dakota, Montana and parts of Canada provide information on the trains’ expected movement, including frequency and county-by-county routes, to the states they traverse. The order also requires that railroads disclose the volume of oil being transported and how emergency responders can contact “at least one responsible party” at the railroad.

Much of the oil from the region is being shipped across the U.S. and Canada in trains of 100 cars or more that accident investigators have described as “moving pipelines.” The trains traverse small towns and big cities alike. Local and state officials, fire chiefs and other emergency responders have complained that they often have no information on the contents of the freight trains moving through communities and their schedules. Nor are they able to force railroads to provide that information, they say.

The department also issued a safety advisory urging shippers to use the most protective type of tank car in their fleets when shipping oil from the Bakken region. The order recommended that to the extent possible shippers not use older model tank cars known as DOT-111s. Accident investigators report the cars have ruptured or punctured, spilling their contents, even in accidents that occurred at speeds under 30 mph.

The tank cars are generally owned by or leased to oil companies that ship the crude, not the railroads.

The emergency order follows a warning two weeks ago from outgoing National Transportation Safety Board Chairwoman Deborah Hersman that the department risks a “higher body count” as the result of fiery oil train accidents if it waits for new safety regulations to become final.

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx announced the moves at a Senate committee hearing Wednesday, saying the department was moving as fast as possible on new safety regulations for crude oil shipments. He said the department sent a proposal last week to the White House that included new tank-car standards and regulations on train speeds, and the safety classification of oil based on its volatility. He said he anticipated final regulations before the end of the year.

Unlike the emergency order, the safety advisory on tank cars is voluntary, noted Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash. Pointing out that oil trains move through “every major city it in the Northwest … hitting every urban center in our state,” she pressed Foxx to move even faster on tougher tank-car standards that would have the force of law.

There have been nine oil train derailments in the U.S. and Canada since March of last year, many of them resulting in intense fires and sometimes the evacuation of nearby residents, according to the NTSB. The latest was last week, when a CSX train carrying Bakken crude derailed in downtown Lynchburg, Va., sending three tank cars into the James River and shooting flames and black smoke into the air. No one was injured, but the wreck prompted an evacuation of nearby buildings.

Concern about the safe transport of crude oil was heightened after a runaway oil train derailed and then exploded last July in the small town of Lac-Megantic in Canada, just across the border from Maine. More than 60 tank cars spilled more than 1.3 million gallons of oil. Forty-seven people were killed and 30 buildings destroyed in resulting inferno.

U.S. crude oil production is forecast to reach 8.5 million barrels a day by the end of this year, up from 5 million barrels a day in 2008. The increase is overwhelmingly due to the Bakken fracking boom. Fracking involves the fracturing of rock with pressurized liquid to free oil and natural gas unreachable through conventional drilling.

Railroad and oil industry officials had no immediate comment on the government’s action.

Study Finds No Evidence Of ‘Ocean-Borne’ Fukushima Radiation Along West Coast

A graduate student in the marine biology program at Cal State Long Beach collects kelp in the waters off of Long Beach during Kelp Watch 2014’s initial collection of samples. (Photo credit: David J. Nelson/Cal State Long Beach)

May 7, 2014

Tom Reopelle CBS Los Angeles

LONG BEACH (CBSLA.com) — The West Coast shoreline shows no signs of ocean-borne radiation from Japan’s Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster, scientists said Wednesday.

KNX 1070′s Tom Reopelle reports researchers from CSU Long Beach and other schools are sampling kelp along the California coastline to determine whether seawater arriving from Japan poses any public health threat.

The Kelp Watch 2014 project – which is co-headed by Dr. Steven Manley, marine biology professor at Long Beach State – has gathered kelp samples from as far north as Kodiak Island, Alaska, to as far south as Baja California to determine the extent of possible radiation contamination from the Fukushima disaster in March 2011.

During the first phase of the project, samples were primarily collected from Feb. 24 through March 14 at 38 of the 44 sites originally identified by researchers for testing of cesium-137 and -134 isotopes, according to researchers.

“So far, it appears that, based on our analysis of kelp, that none of the Fukushima radiation has arrived via the ocean current to our shoreline,” Manley said.

Two sites in the tropics – Hawaii and Guam, where non-kelp brown algae were sampled — were also negative for Fukushima radiation, according to researchers.

Manley noted that the project also has giant kelp from off the coast of Chile in South America that serves as a reference site, far removed from any potential influence from Fukushima.

The study somewhat contradicted earlier findings from a 2012 Long Beach State study that found low levels of radioactive isotopes in seaweed found along the southern Pacific Coast.

While the project’s participants are primarily from academia who have agreed to work pro bono, donors with the USC-Sea Grant and California State University Council on Ocean Affairs, Science & Technology (COAST) have agreed to contribute funds to the project, researchers said.

The second of the three 2014 sampling periods is scheduled to begin in early July.

Report: Climate Change Likely To Reduce Hydropower In The Northwest

A new climate report projects reductions in hydropower of up to 20 percent by 2080. | credit: Sam Beebe Ecotrust/Flickr

By Cassandra Profita, OPB

A national report released Tuesday says climate change will make it increasingly difficult for the Northwest to generate hydropower and protect salmon at the same time.

The Northwest gets 75 percent of its electricity from dams. As climate change reduces summer stream flows, the Northwest Climate Assessment report says the result will likely be less hydropower production from those dams – with reductions of up to 20 percent by 2080.

The reductions would be necessary to preserve stream flows for threatened and endangered fish, according to Amy Snover, director of the Climate Impacts Group and co-lead author of the Northwest report. Snover says with climate change leaving less water in rivers during the summer, what’s left will have to be divided between storage for hydropower and flows for fish.

“It will be increasingly difficult to meet the two goals of producing summer and fall hydropower and maintaining sufficient flows in the river for protected and endangered fish,” she said. “You can reduce some of the negative impacts on hydropower production but you can’t do that and maintain the fish flows.”

Snover says her report’s projections are based on the way the Northwest operates hydroelectric dams right now. But that could change. Regional power managers say climate change is leading them to reconsider how they will operate dams in the future.

John Fazio, an analyst with the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, says climate change is going to shift demand for electricity in the region, too.

Winters will be warmer, so people will need less power than before at a time of year when there’s lots of water in the rivers. And as summers get hotter, there will be more need for power to cool people off at a time of year when there’s less water available to generate hydropower.

Fazio has been thinking about the best way to manage the hydro system under these climate change scenarios. He’s suggested using other sources of power in the winter to make sure the system’s reservoirs are full of water by summertime.

“My suggestion would be during the summer we could pull more water from reservoirs to make up for decrease in summer flows and then going into the winter, use generation from other sources to meet our (power) loads and let the reservoirs refill,” he said.

Fazio’s ideas are outlined the council’s latest 20-year plan for meeting the region’s demand for power.

“It would call for a change in the whole approach to how we operate the hydro system,” Fazio said. “So far it hasn’t gotten any traction anywhere. It’s a complicated issue, but we’re trying to tackle it.”

Bonneville Power Administration, which manages 31 dams in the Columbia River Basin and distributes most of the electricity in the Northwest, has been pondering the issue of climate change as well. It’s developed a road map for adapting to climate change and launched pilot projects to model the effects of climate change on stream flows in the Columbia River Basin.

Arts & Tech students start gardens

Marysville Arts & Technology High School senior Nikki Cooley and sophomore Emalee Alaniz plant seeds in one of the school’s 16 garden beds on April 30.— image credit: Kirk Boxleitner — Marysville Arts & Technology High School senior Nikki Cooley and sophomore Emalee Alaniz plant seeds in one of the school’s 16 garden beds on April 30.
— image credit: Kirk Boxleitner

By Kirk Boxleitner, Marysville Globe

TULALIP — The unloading of a truck full of compost at the Marysville Arts & Technology High School on Wednesday, April 30, represented the culmination of a six-year dream for Arts & Tech math teacher Karen McCaffrey, and a unique opportunity for Arts & Tech students get dirty while growing their own food.

“Last year, we finally started a club devoted to growing local food,” McCaffrey said. “Not only is the process of gardening a valuable experience, but it teaches these kids how essential these foods are to their health and well-being.”

The Arts & Tech gardens benefitted from the fourth annual Compost Days campaign — jointly coordinated by Cedar Grove, Waste Management, King County and Seattle Public Utilities — which conducted its Big Garden Give, the region’s first compost drive, providing free compost to 120 gardens that grow food for low-income communities in Snohomish and King counties.

John Inge, marketing director for Cedar Grove, stopped by the school that Wednesday with Zsolt Pasztor, production manager of Farmer Frog, to watch the final truckload of compost get dumped next to the Arts & Tech gardens.

“Throughout Snohomish County, we’ve contributed 500 yards of compost to as many as 20 community gardens,” Inge said. “Yesterday, we dropped off about 10 yards, and today, we’re adding about 15 yards to the Arts & Tech school gardens. As much as we talk about the compost loop, it’s incredible to witness personally how the food and yard waste that we receive is now being used to grow fresh food, rather than going into landfills.”

Inge credited Washington State University with helping to connect Cedar Grove, and the other members of the Compost Days campaign, to community organizations, as well as assisting in coordinating their efforts.

“They’ve been invaluable in linking us to deserving recipients,” Inge said. “This way, we can provide support to gardens that serve all segments of the community.”

As the Arts & Tech students shoveled compost into wheelbarrows and poured it into the eight-foot by four-foot garden beds behind the school building, Pasztor explained the process that Farmer Frog facilitated beforehand.

“It started with the ground being covered with burlap, so that no light would reach the ground,” Pasztor said. “Wood chips were then laid down over the burlap, about four to six inches deep. We have a source of burlap and a connection with loggers to get the wood chips, which amounted to about 10 yards, covering a 20-foot by 30-foot area.”

From there, 16 garden beds were built over the wood chips, with pressure-treated lumber, of which eight were filled with the 10 yards of compost from Cedar Grove on Tuesday, April 29.

“We received 15 yards of compost today, which would probably fill 12 garden beds, but it’s better to have too much than not enough,” Pasztor said on April 30. “We also provided eight 10-gallon buckets with compost and strawberry plants. There’s a growing distance between people’s food and how it’s made, so we want to bring people closer to that food-making, so that they don’t just think of food as coming from Safeway or Albertsons.”

Pasztor also anticipates that Arts & Tech students will be able to apply their lessons in biology in a hands-on fashion in their gardens, perhaps even by doing experiments to see which factors cause plants to grow better.

The Arts & Tech students who volunteered to work the dirt and plant seeds on April 30 agree that they’re seeking closer connections, not only to the source of their food, but also to the community around them.

“I just like growing things,” said sophomore Emalee Alaniz, as she watered one of the garden beds. “It’s nice when you can grow your food more naturally.”

“I like that everyone here has come together as a team to make this happen,” said senior Nikki Cooley, who joined Alaniz in planting seeds in the compost. “I don’t usually get to work with all of these people, so I’m getting to know new people while I’m gardening, which is something I’m already experienced at. When you go to the store, you have to worry whether their fruits and vegetables have been treated with chemicals, but our fruits and vegetables will not only be locally grown, but they’ll be fresh, healthy and delicious.”

“It’s a healthier alternative,” agreed fellow senior Damon Diel Jr. “It also helps save money for the school.”

McCaffrey explained that the food grown in the Arts & Tech gardens would be prioritized, first to go to the students who helped grow it, then to go to community members in need who would be invited to take part in gardening there, with any remaining or leftover food likely going to community groups such as the Marysville Community Food Bank.

“This garden will be a source of ongoing joy for generations to come,” Marysville Arts and Technology High School Principal Terri Kaltenbach said.

The annual Compost Days campaign is a thank-you to area residents for diverting 350,000 tons of food, food soiled-paper and yard debris from landfills. From March 15 through April 15, residents received deep discounts on compost, and donated 30,200 bags of compost in turn, to help grow food in 120 gardens that feed communities.

“Making locally produced compost available to community gardens is an important first step in providing nutritious food for those that need it the most,” said Candy Castellanos, public education outreach manager for Waste Management. “Using compost is the most sustainable, environmentally supportive and efficient way to garden, and we are proud to play a role in growing gardens locally.”

For more information, visit www.compostdays.com.