10th Birthday for Yellowstone's Wolves
Next Monday will mark precisely 10 years since wolves re-appeared in Yellowstone National Park, from where they had been absent since the 1920s. The re-introduction program was a smashing success, far exceeding even optimistic predictions.
On March 21, 1995, federal biologists finally opened the acclimation pens holding 14 gray wolves, sometimes called timber wolves, brought from Alberta. Earlier that year an additional 14 wolves had been set free in central Idaho's mammoth wilderness. And the following year, 17 more wolves were released into Yellowstone and 20 more into Idaho.
A decade later, Yellowstone's wolf population has grown more than five-fold and expanded into adjacent areas of Wyoming and Montana. Idaho's wolf population expanded even more spectacularly--by thirteen-fold--with an estimated 452 animals in the Gem State at last count in 2004. All told, over 850 wolves now roam the US Rocky Mountains. It's only a matter of time until they begin returning in numbers to Washington and Oregon, where they are now only rare visitors. [Click on the chart at left for state-by-state trends.]
Fuels Rush In
This Eugene Register-Guard editorial--cautioning Oregon's politicians to take a sober, hype-free look at biofuels before launching a program to subsidize them--is definitely worth reading. But it makes one point that, while not clearly out-and-out wrong, at least deserves a closer look.
According to the editorial, legislative action to promote biofuels in Oregon would be unnecessary...
...if biofuels could compete with other forms of energy in the marketplace. The fact that ethanol and biodiesel need the Legislature's encouragement is evidence that these fuels suffer an economic disadvantage, have environmental costs or both.
Hold on, there, buckeroo. Petroleum gets huge subsidies of its own, ranging from special tax benefits for oil companies, to the mammoth military costs for defending access to overseas oil supplies, to the environmental and social costs of air & water pollution, greenhouse gases, etc. So just because ethanol needs subsidies to compete with petroleum, doesn't necessarily mean that ethanol is inherently uncompetitive; it could just be that petroleum's massive subsidies outweigh those to ethanol.
To Cut Or Not To Cut? II
The Eugene Register-Guard continues its high-quality coverage of forest issues with today's op-ed by Jeremy Hall of Oregon Natural Resources Council (ONRC). He makes the case that logging on federal land can be a good thing.
ONRC wants chainsaws to stay out of roadless areas and old growth stands, but thinks they do belong in dense even-aged plantation stands where thinning may actually benefit forest ecosystems. ONRC's position is far from accepted conventional wisdom among environmental groups, but today's article is a concise and cogent statement of their position.
As a reader of this blog pointed out, small-stem trees may not always be as merchantable as bigger old growth. So one way to encourage more thinning and less clearcutting (especially of old growth) is to promote green building and forest certification standards that prize conscientious cutting and small diameter logs.
California, Here We Come, VII
The Washington House of Representatives passed the clean-car bill, as the Post-Intelligencer reports! This bill would bring California's vehicle-emission standards to Washington. What will the Senate do?
(Follow this issue backwards, starting here.)
