My friends aren’t so sure though. I’ve asked ten of them, and only four think it’s mainly the liquor at fault. So although no one denies I’m in serious danger of liver failure, there’s some uncertainty over the cause, particularly among non-doctors.

Whatever. The point is: I’m heading out to happy hour soon.

If by chance my reasoning strikes you as problematic, you may enjoy reading the results of a thorough survey of published climate science:

The survey considered the work of some 29,000 scientists published in 11,994 academic papers. Of the 4,000-plus papers that took a position on the causes of climate change only 0.7% or 83 of those thousands of academic articles, disputed the scientific consensus that climate change is the result of human activity, with the view of the remaining 2.2% unclear.

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

Today, Sightline is releasing a new report in Canada, one that tallies the potential carbon emissions from fossil fuel export infrastructure planned throughout the Pacific Northwest.

Across British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington there are active proposals for seven new or expanded coal terminals, three new oil pipelines, and six new natural gas pipelines. The projects are distinct, but they can be denominated in a common currency: the tons of carbon dioxide emitted if the fossil fuels were burned. Taken together, these projects would be capable of delivering enough fuel to release an additional 761 million metric tons of carbon-dioxide.

The Northwest enjoys a reputation for leadership in clean energy and environmental policy. Yet the new fossil fuel infrastructure planned for British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington would eclipse the region’s green reputation, transforming the Northwest from an aspiring climate leader into a carbon export hub of global consequence.

You can find the full report here.

Sightline will be releasing a US version of this report soon, so American readers should keep their eyes peeled.

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

Coal dust shrouds an East Coast coal train. Photo credit paulv2c.

Roger O. McClellan is regularly trotted out by coal export backers whenever they are trying to dismiss concerns about coal dust pollution. Yet last week in a Seattle Times opinion piece on  pollution from coal transport, he called for a comprehensive review of coal export plans, including along railways:

Debate over the terminals should be grounded in scientific facts and analysis. Well-established scientific approaches should be used to evaluate any potential environmental and human-health impacts.

Scientific assessments such as the one being conducted by the Army Corps of Engineers should provide clarity and context for decisions by public officials. Science-based assessments should also identify any constraints needed to assure protection of the environment and public health. The public at large should encourage and, indeed, demand such assessments.

Good for him.

Although this is not the first time McClellan has said he supports a comprehensive review, such a plain public statement should come as a blow to coal export proponents.

When someone like McClellan calls for a comprehensive analysis of the dangers of coal dust escape from trains, it signals the true breadth of the opposition to fast-tracking approval for the proposed terminals. He has, after all, made a career of arguing for relaxed air quality standards, and he has often been paid by fossil fuel interests to provide expert testimony to government regulators. Yet as McClellan says, the Power Past Coal campaign and others are absolutely right to demand a region-wide assessment of the impacts of shipping coal.

Now I think it’s fair to say that McClellan is skeptical that coal dust escape is harmful. Fine. My own review of the science suggests that while the evidence is worrisome, it is spotty enough not to support definite conclusions.

We should all be able to agree, however, that the right course of action is a thorough scientific review of risks to the environment and human health—a review that includes a look at potential contamination along Northwest railways. I hope that the coal export backers will now come around on this point.

At the risk of nit-picking, however, the article did contain at least one factual error that should be corrected. He writes:

Coal from the Powder River Basin in Wyoming and Montana is currently being shipped by rail to ports in Washington state and Oregon… These terminals, which serve as a gateway to Asia, have been an important part of the regional economy for more than a century.

I’m really not sure where this comes from.

Neither Washington nor Oregon ship any coal to Asia. In fact, neither state has a coal terminal of any kind. Needless to say, then, coal ports are not an important part of the regional economy!

Maybe he’s mixed up about British Columbia’s Westshore Terminal? As I’ve documented, that terminal has been receiving modest volumes of US coal since about 2009, coal that does travel via railway in Washington. But even that doesn’t explain the “more than a century” bit because Westshore has only been around since 1970.

According to official figures, the volume of coal now traveling to Westshore—around 4 million tons if you believe US Customs and around 8 million tons if you believe the terminal—is miniscule compared to 100 million tons planned for proposed new terminals in Oregon and Washington. In other words, the region’s past experience with coal trains and coal dust is no guide at all to the future envisioned by coal terminal supporters.

Before the Northwest goes down that road, we should know more—a lot more—about the risks of coal and coal dust. That’s something that environmental activists and industry experts alike can agree on.

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

With the Supreme Court demanding more money for basic education, both Governor Inslee and the House have moved to close the loophole. Both aim to redirect the $40.8 million from oil companies to classrooms, but some in the Senate are defending the refiners.

So as a way to make clear what closing the loophole would do for public education, here’s a simple graphic explanation:

All figures used in this post come directly from Governor Inslee’s proposed budget, particularly the tax exemption fact sheet and the education funding supplement.

Graphic design by Devin Porter at GoodMeasures.biz.

Notes and sources. By necessity, the labels in the chart are more concise than the language typically used to described these funding categories. The detail-oriented can find fuller explanation below, all of it drawn directly from the governor’s budget:

• Support for new teachers - Fund the Beginning Educator Support Team (BEST) approach for all teachers in their first three years on the job. About 2,000 first-year teachers are hired in Washington each year, and as the state emerges from the recession, our schools will be hiring more. Research shows students of well-supported first-year teachers demonstrate achievement gains equivalent to the students of fourth-year veterans. BEST supports new teachers by including additional paid time for weekly meetings with mentors and more opportunities for peer observation and feedback on teaching. Mentor teachers will receive compensation for taking on this important leadership role. ($37.5 million)
• Dropout prevention – Prevent students in grades six through nine from dropping out. Though districts are able to identify students in these grades who are at risk of dropping out, they need more resources to support them and keep them engaged. School districts will receive additional learning assistance funding based on 15 percent of students in grades six through nine. This money can be used for academic liaisons, tutoring or small-group instruction. Supports will help students who are behind academically to catch up, including those who need additional instructional assistance due to suspensions or expulsions. Again, districts will tailor these research-proven support strategies so they offer the most effective ones to meet their students’ needs. ($25.3 million)
• 3rd grade literacy – Ensure third-grade literacy. Districts will receive a larger allocation for the Learning Assistance Program, which offers extra instructional help to struggling students, based on the prior year’s count of students who did not meet state standard for third grade literacy. Districts will implement literacy activities that work best in their own communities. ($12.5 million)
• STEM enrollment pool - Create a competitive enrollment pool for the public four-year universities. This will help industry fill positions with qualified employees, especially those in STEM fields. Winning proposals must demonstrate innovation and cost efficiency. Such new investment allows us to grow the workforce that our economy needs. ($11.0 million)
• STEM Innovation Alliance - In the past 10 years, science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) jobs have grown three times faster than non-STEM jobs. Skills learned through STEM education are essential in a wide range of employment fields. Governor Inslee’s proposal creates the STEM Education Innovation Alliance to implement a bold, results-driven approach to align the work of state agencies and resources with a comprehensive preschool-through-graduate school strategy to improve the quality of STEM education. The Alliance’s membership of business, labor, nonprofit and education organization partnerships is dedicated to help accomplish the state’s education goals. The proposal also calls for building a talent pipeline from high school to college, and then career, by expanding industry-developed high school skills programs and allowing credits earned in high school to transfer to college. ($10.9 million)
• Clean Energy Institute at UW – Create a Clean Energy Institute at the University of Washington to focus on next-generation energy storage and solar energy. Additional staff, advanced computing support and, most importantly, a clear mission will make the institute a global model in this emerging sector. ($12.0 million)
• Biofuels Center at WSU – Invest in Washington State University’s Center for Bioproducts and Biofuels in the Tri-Cities to leverage new federal and private grants and scale up its promising efforts. Ramping up research funding will help keep the region at the forefront of alternative and biofuels research. ($5.2 million)
• Preschool for poor kids – Expand preschool opportunities. The state’s Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program (ECEAP) supplements the federal Head Start program in providing preschool for low-income 3- and 4-year-old children. Research is clear that for many children, access to high-quality early learning programs improves kindergarten readiness, success in school, graduation rates and outcomes in adult life. Together, however, Head Start and ECEAP serve just two-thirds of the state’s eligible preschool population. The proposal gives access to 3,035 more eligible children and includes quality improvements such as more class time for preschoolers, educator professional development and site visits. ($35.0 million)

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

Photo courtesy of Paul K Anderson. Used with permission.

Huge news on the coal export front just now. As Scott Learn at The Oregonian reports, “Kinder Morgan drops plan to build coal export terminal at Port of St. Helens industrial park.”

Kinder Morgan had been planning to export as much as 30 million tons of coal each year on the Columbia River from a site near Clatskanie, Oregon, but their plans ran into a buzz saw of opposition from local communities, environmental and health advocates, and even nearby industrial users. This morning they announced that they are officially abandoning their plans to build a coal terminal at Port Westward.

Sightline’s research was instrumental in the debate. We published extensive documentation of Kinder Morgan’s problems with coal dust at their terminals, as well as the company’s lengthy rap sheet of fraud, illegal dumping, and lax safety. A month after we published our research, the utility PGE announced that it would not sublease its land at Port Westward to Kinder Morgan out of concern that the spread of coal dust would damage its gas turbines. Since then, the firm has struggled to configure its plans, but local opposition continued to mount while prices in Asia weakened.

Today’s news amounts to a huge victory for the Power Past Coal campaign. Of the six coal export terminals originally planned for the Northwest, three have now been withdrawn, in large part owing to an enormous backlash to the plans.

Predictably, Kinder Morgan is trying to downplay the role of coal export opponents in thwarting the company’s plans:

Kinder Morgan’s Allen Fore attributed the decision not to seek permits for a coal export terminal to site logistics at the Port of St. Helens industrial park, not the controversy over coal.

“We looked at multiple options and different footprints, but we couldn’t find one compatible with the facility we wanted to construct,” Fore said.

Yet the firm’s statement is revealing. Kinder Morgan had a specific project design that they presented to the public. After PGE rejected the plan—out of very justifiable objection to Kinder Morgan’s inability to contain coal dust—it had to go back to the drawing board. Having lost the element of surprise, they were met with opposition at every turn.

Kinder Morgan says, cryptically, that they are, “still looking for coal export sites in the Northwest,” though they won’t name specific sites.

Postscript 5/14/13: A reader points out that this is actually Kinder Morgan’s second failed coal terminal project this year. The company backed out of plans at the Port of Wilmington, Delaware after they failed to reach agreement with the local longshoreman’s union.

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

Nationally, the big story was that coal exports fell for the second consecutive quarter. By the end of 2012, quarterly shipments were down by 25 percent from the historic highs registered during the second quarter. Still, at 28 million tons, coal exports remained very high by historical standards.

A bit player in the national coal export story, the Western Customs District exported a little more than 2.1 million tons in the fourth quarter, a 16 percent increase from the third quarter.

The West was the only part of the country to see an increase in coal exports, a somewhat surprising trend given that the region’s major coal shipping venue, the Seattle Customs District, registered a steep decline. Seattle District shipments—entirely accounted for by coal traveling north from Washington into British Columbia for onward shipment to Asia—fell to 980,000 tons, a 39 percent decline from the high water mark in the third quarter. The decrease was almost certainly the result of damage to the coal-loading trestle at BC’s Westshore Terminal.

Coal exports rose sharply in both the Los Angeles District (presumably from LAXT at Long Beach) and the Anchorage District (from the Seward Coal Loading Facility).

As in previous quarters, Cloud Peak Energy claimed responsibility for nearly all the coal transiting the Seattle Customs District. According to their fourth quarter investor report, “Asian exports were approximately 0.9 million tons in the fourth quarter 2012 compared to 1.0 million tons in the fourth quarter 2011.”

For all of 2012, US Customs officially reported a bit more than 4.7 million tons of coal exported from the Seattle District. Over the same period, Cloud Peak took credit for 4.4 million tons of shipments to Asia. Assuming that all of Cloud Peak’s coal exits via the Seattle District, which is very probable, their numbers indicate that few other coal firms are currently in the Northwest coal exports business. Signal Peak may be playing a small role, and Westshore has also claimed to be exporting coal from Peabody, though the terminal’s managers have not made these shipment figures public.

The official US Customs figures reported by the US Department of Energy—those I’m relying on in this blog post—should be treated with caution. In some cases they are at odds with the numbers given by coal terminals, by anecdotal accounts of coal train movements, and with shipment claims by the coal industry. For example, financial information for the Westshore Terminal implies that the Seattle District exported something like 8.6 million tons in 2012, compared to the 4.7 million reported by US officials. (See p. 6, “Shipments from [US thermal coal] shippers accounted for approximately 29% of Westshore’s volume in 2012.”)

For example, one continuing mystery is the Great Falls Customs District, which includes the Sweetgrass, Montana border crossing, the logical route from the Powder River Basin to the Ridley Coal Terminal at Prince Rupert. Official reports continue to show near-zero figures at Sweetgrass. Yet rail watchers report that several coal trains are crossing the border each week, and the Ridley Terminal also claims to be handling at least a modest volume of US coal.

The EIA is promising final 2012 data in June, and I’ll report on it here when it’s available.

Thanks to Pam MacRae for research assistance.

All figures in this post are given in short tons. My previous reporting on quarterly coal export volumes can be found here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. All data come from the US EIA’s latest quarterly coal report, covering the entire Western Customs Region. In addition to the districts shown on the chart here, the Western Region includes the Portland, Nogales, San Diego, and San Francisco Districts. These districts have been reporting virtually no coal exports.

Please note: The second chart shows Customs Districts, not individual ports. The Port of Seattle does not move coal, for example.

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

Fidalgo Island Oil Refinery near Anacortes, WA by 24hourmoon, cc

Big news just now on Washington’s accidental tax loophole for big oil: the House voted to close it as part of a larger package of reforms to even out the state’s tax code and raise money for public education. Closing the “extracted fuel use tax exemption”—the tongue-twisting name for our special giveway to big oil—will redirect $41 million per biennium from oil refiners to classrooms.

Governor Inslee has already endorsed the move in his budget, so the last obstacle to the loophole’s closure is the state Senate where a functional Republican majority appears more inclined to protect the tax preference for oil companies.

That’s a troubling position because there are few clearer cases of mistaken tax policy than this one. The loophole was first created in 1949, apparently as a small benefit to sawmills. At the time, Washington was home to exactly zero oil refineries, but when they later moved into the state, refiners ended up claiming fully 98 percent of the loophole’s benefit. Even the state’s formal bipartisan tax review committee can identify no public policy purpose for the loophole.

It’s time we close it.

Check out Washington Environmental Council’s press release for more details on this afternoon’s vote.

You can find more information about the tax loophole here:

• SIGHTLINE FACT SHEET: Washington’s Extracted Fuel Tax Loophole

• Hog-Wild Loophole
• The Accidental Tax Loophole
• The Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee (JLARC) assessment
• The Department of Revenue summary
• The RCW

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

Photo credit designwallah, cc

It’s been almost two years since we first wrote about the minor plague of the white pages. Customers don’t use them and phone companies don’t want to distribute them. Although almost no one wanted more printed white pages, an outdated law in Washington required their delivery every fifteen months, like it or not.

It was a colossal waste, a perfect example of sustainability made illegal. It was absurd.

Last week, however, state regulators finally agreed to change the law.

No longer will state residents hear the annoying thud of unwanted white pages, and no longer will state law mandate pointless waste. Under the new regulations, phone companies are free to not deliver physical phone books. Since the telecoms already don’t want to print and deliver them in metropolitan areas, they won’t. In rural areas, where white and yellow page directories are typically co-bound and much slimmer, the phone companies will likely continue to deliver phone books, but they are now required to provide an “opt-out” mechanism for customers who want to avoid automatic delivery. Washington will now join at least 18 other states where white pages directories are not delivered by legal mandate.

It’s important to note that optional delivery will not be unfair to the poor or elderly. At Sightline’s urging, the state’s new regulations require phone companies to provide free printed directories to those who request them, and to make electronic directories available on the web. (And contrary to an oddball argument made by the state Attorney General’s office, optional white pages will not jeopardize public safety.)

Ending Washington’s regime of mandatory white pages may seem like a small thing, yet it is worth celebrating. It marks the end of a pointless waste of resources, a little less annoyance for state residents, and reduced public costs for waste management. It’s a great example of how we can make sustainability legal.

A few thanks are in order. Sightline’s Pam MacRae helped draft innumerable formal comments to state regulators, and Sightline’s board president Jeanette Henderson, a veteran of the yellow pages wars, slogged with us through a very long rule-making process. We were fortunate to be joined in our quest by the City of Seattle, particularly by Councilmember Mike O’Brien and his staff, and by Tim Croll, solid waste director at Seattle Public Utilities. Here is the City’s official statement on the new regulations.

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

Targeted for closure by Governor Inslee and the House democrats, the oil industry’s last hope for protecting its $41 million annual gift from taxpayers is in the republican-controlled Senate. That explains why a key Senate committee is holding a work session on what they are calling “energy sector taxation and recycled fuels.”

It looks like a green-washing turn of phrase was the best the oil lobbyists could come up with. But the truth is, Washington’s oil refiners take advantage of unintentionally loose language in a decades-old statute to avoid a tax that everyone else pays. So to clear up what this is all about, I’ve put together a helpful backgrounder:

FACT SHEET: Washington’s Extracted Fuel Tax Loophole

And if you want to dig deeper, Sightline has written in more detail about it:

• Hog-Wild Loophole
• The Accidental Tax Loophole

The Senate committee’s work session will be held in Olympia on April 17 at 8:00 a.m. in the J.A. Cherberg Building, Senate Hearing Room 4.

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.

Coal train and dust. Photo credit: Columbia Riverkeeper

It may be easy to think that the coal export debate is mostly about trains, street closures, coal dust, and vessel traffic. And it is about that. But it is equally about the big country east of the Rockies where new mines and rail projects act like daggers pointed at a much older way of life.

Like many tribes in the interior, the Northern Cheyenne are staunch opponents of the coal export proposals in Oregon and Washington. For a taste of their righteous fury, I highly recommend reading Vanessa Braided Hair on Why the Otter Creek Mine Will Never Be Built.

Here’s an excerpt:

Arch Coal understands money. What Arch Coal doesn’t understand is community. They don’t understand history. They don’t understand the Cheyenne people whose ancestors fought and died for the land that they are proposing to destroy. They don’t understand the fierceness with which the people, both Indian and non-Indian, in southeastern Montana love the land.

This is why not one dragline will rip the coal from the earth and not one dynamite blast will loosen the precious topsoil. It is why not one rail car will be loaded with coal and why not one toxic orange cloud will pass over someone’s house or the Tongue River. It is why not one burial site will be dug up and why not one elk will be displaced. It is why our water will continue to run clean and plentiful and our wildlife will continue to roam free.

This is why the proposed Otter Creek mine in southeastern Montana will never be built.

It’s good a good reminder that what happens in the remote Tongue River Valley—where Arch coal aims to open up a new mine in order to export coal to Asia—will impact downtown Seattle and other coastal cities. Just so, what happens on the shores of the Columbia River and Puget Sound—where coal interests want to build export terminals—will impact wildlands and communities in the interior West.

Sightline Institute researches the best practices in public policy for a sustainable Pacific Northwest. Read more at daily.sightline.org.