News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
Sorted by date Results 1 - 13 of 13
Starting this summer, Oregonians across the state will begin to receive a standardized list of what can and cannot be recycled statewide, and owners and managers of apartment complexes and multi-unit housing will need to prepare to provide recycling for residents. These are among new rules around recycling finalized Friday by Oregon’s Environmental Quality Commission following four years of negotiation and planning. The Plastic Pollution and Recycling Modernization Act will go into effect July 1, 2025, making it easier for O... Full story
The 2024 fire season cost Oregon emergency response agencies nearly $350 million, and the state leaders are struggling to find a way to cover outstanding bills. Gov. Tina Kotek announced Tuesday, November 26, following reporting from Oregon Public Broadcasting that she’ll call a special session of the Legislature on December 12 to appropriate at least $218 million from the state’s general fund to cover remaining fire costs. Lawmakers will already be at the Capitol for committee hearings during that time. More than half of... Full story
Oregon school districts are projected to pay $670 million more to the state’s public employee pension program over the next two years, potentially wiping out all increases to school funding proposed by Gov. Tina Kotek. The increased tab, more than 10 percent for some districts, follows lagging returns in investments of the Public Employees Retirement system (PERS) and could affect teaching and learning in some schools. “Next year’s sharp jumps in PERS rates will take significant money away from classrooms without making life... Full story
More than 1 million acres of federal land in central and southern Oregon could soon be leased for solar energy projects. Officials at the federal Bureau of Land Management announced Aug. 29 they had finalized a plan to add Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Washington and Wyoming to its existing Western Solar Plan – an Obama-era project that expanded permitting for solar projects on federal land. When it was first implemented in 2012, it only included Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah. The expansion includes 1... Full story
Persistent drought in the West over the last two decades has limited the amount of electricity that hydropower dams can generate, costing the industry and the region billions of dollars in revenue. The sector lost about 300 million megawatt hours of power generation between 2003 and 2020 due to drought and low water compared with the long-term average, researchers from the University of Alabama found. That equals about $28 billion in lost revenue. Half of the drop in power generation was due to drought in Oregon, Washington,... Full story
A statewide “wildfire risk map” that drew the ire of many Oregonians will return in several weeks with few changes but with a new name following a yearlong makeover. The new “wildfire hazard map,” set to debut in mid-to-late July, will not differ in substance too much from the previous map published in 2022, according to lead researcher Chris Dunn, an Oregon State University forestry professor and wildfire expert. That first map was quickly taken offline in August 2022, just months after it was released, due to public... Full story
Ecosystems in the Northwest were heavily shaped by wolves before they were nearly wiped out of the region, a new study finds. By the 1930s, gray wolves were nearly gone in Oregon and the rest of the West, leading to the multiplication of animals the wolves hunted and creating an imbalance in the environment, researchers at Oregon State University found. But the full impact of their disappearance isn't fully understood because ecological research from the last century largely l... Full story
Oregon and Washington leaders are using the start of the region's wildfire season to once again ask Congress for more money for prescribed burns. The practice of strategically starting low-intensity fires across forests to improve soil and ecosystem health and prevent catastrophic wildfires has been common among tribes in the West for millenia. In recent years, it has gained more traction among the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, and the Oregon Department... Full story
Electricity demand in the Northwest is expected to grow more than 30 percent in the next decade, or about five percent more than estimated last year and triple the prediction three years ago, industry experts said in a new report. Large data centers, an increase in high-tech manufacturing and growing electrification in homes, buildings, and transportation are key factors in the forecast. The projections are in an annual report published Wednesday, May 1, by the Portland-based industry trade group Pacific Northwest Utilities C... Full story
Oregon’s getting better at preventing and responding to wildfires, experts said Thursday, April 25, but much more still needs to be done. A panel of University of Oregon professors who study climate change, smoke, and wildfire discussed the 2024 wildfire season in an online forum with journalists as the West braces for summer fires. “Wildfire risk in the West and in Oregon this year is not abnormally higher than in recent years,” said Daniel Gavin, a professor in the geography department who specializes in paleoecology — the... Full story
The Oregon Department of Forestry needs more and consistent funding to fight wildfires. That much was clear following the 2020 Labor Day fires that burned nearly 850,000 acres of forests and became the state’s most expensive disaster in history. But lawmakers are split on how to pay for it. Two Democratic senators recently unveiled competing proposals to address long-term wildfire funding. Sen. Jeff Golden, D-Ashland, wants a tax on the value of industrial timber harvests to pay for protection that he says d... Full story
America’s oldest trees, most of which are in the West, will get added protection from wildfire and climate change under updated forest plans from the U.S. Forest Service. In announcements over the past week, officials from the Forest Service said they would begin the process of amending forest management plans affecting all 128 of the agency’s forest and grasslands, including the Northwest Forest Plan governing federal forests in northern California, Oregon, and Washington. The amendments, both nationally and in the Nor... Full story
Glacial melt from climate change is no longer just a problem at the poles. Across the contiguous Western U.S., glaciers are slowly disappearing, according to a new analysis by researchers at Portland State University and the U.S. Geological Survey. The study was published in the journal Earth System Science Data on September 15. Without glaciers, people, plants, and animals are more vulnerable to late summer drought. Glaciers play an important role in regulating waterways, act... Full story
