text:
On June 27, hundreds of people packed the Oakland City Council meeting where a proposal to ban the transport of coal through the California city was up for a vote. Speakers on both sides of the issue delivered passionate arguments, pitting the promise of good jobs in a depressed area against concern about environmental impacts. The meeting quickly became rowdy. "There was a lot of tension," says Rev. Ken Chambers, pastor of West Side Missionary Baptist Church in West Oakland, who spoke in support of the ban. Pro-coal supporters stationed in the audience heckled him throughout his address, and at times, Lynette Gibson McElhaney, the council president, struggled to maintain order.
"Officers," she requested, "please escort those persons who continue to have disrespectful outbursts outside of the chamber."
The vote came after more than a year of heated debate over plans to build a marine terminal, from which coal mined in Utah could be shipped to Asia. The proposed terminal was part of a larger redevelopment project slated for the old Oakland Army Base, located in West Oakland, a predominantly black neighborhood that's among the region's poorest and most polluted.
One by one, the seven council members present voted to uphold the ban on transporting coal. The decision was finalized by a second vote on July 19, leaving the proposed $250 million project in limbo. Without coal as one of the terminal's possible bulk commodities, proponents warned, it would be at risk of losing critical funding — depriving an economically struggling neighborhood of job opportunities. Critics of the plan, however, worried that transporting millions of tons of coal by rail — even in covered cars — through West Oakland poses a public health and safety risk to local residents, who already experience high levels of air pollution.
The decision — and the wider controversy around it — places Oakland at the center of a growing battle over coal exports on the West Coast. From British Columbia all the way to California, plans for new export terminals are faltering, thanks to opposition from local communities concerned about climate change and the environmental impacts of fossil fuel development.
Working against that movement, however, is a network of powerful financial interests that have invested heavily in coal and are now desperate to find a way to recoup their investments and somehow still profit. The Oakland terminal was an important part of a larger plan to sell landlocked Utah coal overseas. And it was hatched in a web of money and politics that entangled struggling communities in two vastly different regions: West Oakland and rural Utah.
Carbon County, Utah, got its name from the vast amounts of coal found in the rugged country southeast of Salt Lake City. Coal mining took off in the late 1880s, bringing jobs along with the occasional violent upheaval. In 1897, legendary bank robber Butch Cassidy and his partner, William Ellsworth "Elzy" Lay, stole the $8,000 payroll of the Pleasant Valley Coal Company, which operated mines in the county. And later, two mine explosions, one in 1900 and the other in 1924, killed nearly 400 people.
Despite the early tumult, Carbon County grew to depend on coal economically. For most of the last century, it looked like a good bet, with coal supplying the vast majority of Utah's energy needs. Other states wanted Utah's coal as well. In the early 1980s, an electrical utility cooperative in Southern California helped persuade the state to build a massive power plant, the Intermountain Power Project (IPP), in Delta, Utah, promising to buy its coal-generated electricity.
But Carbon County's fortune changed as utilities increasingly moved to replace coal with cheaper natural gas and renewables like solar and wind energy. In 2013, the city of Los Angeles, which had a contract with IPP, voted to end its reliance on coal-fired electricity by 2025, in favor of natural gas. The decision hit Carbon County hard, says County Commissioner Jae Potter. Between 75 and 80 percent of the county's jobs rely on coal mining and power generation. Over the last several years, hundreds of locals have lost their jobs as coal-fired power plants have closed and mines have shuttered.
"It put us into a tailspin," says Potter. "What do you do?"
But the collapsing coal market still looked profitable to one private equity firm – Galena Private Equity Resources, registered in the Cayman Islands. (Private equity firms buy up troubled or undervalued businesses and other assets, then re-structure and sell them.)
In 2013, Galena invested over $104 million in Bowie Resources, a Kentucky-based coal firm, acquiring a significant minority stake in a new joint venture company called Bowie Resource Partners. Backed by money from Galena's private investors, Bowie began buying the assets of other coal companies on the verge of bankruptcy. In Utah, Bowie bought three mines from Arch Coal, which filed for bankruptcy in January.
"Galena has built an impressive record of prudently selecting high performing investments," said Jeremy Weir, CEO of Galena Asset Management, in a press release. "We believe that Bowie Resource Partners has a unique opportunity to reshape the Western US coal paradigm."
But for the investment to pay off, Bowie needed to get that coal out of Utah and overseas to Asia, where, in contrast to the U.S. market, demand still seemed insatiable. To do that, however, it needed access to West Coast ports.
Galena was not the only private equity firm to bet on coal. Lighthouse Resources, a Salt Lake City-based firm, owns two mines — one in Montana and the other in Wyoming — and is the main driver behind the proposed Millennium Bulk Terminal in Washington and the Morrow Pacific coal export project in Oregon.
"For Galena, the hope was that they would help transform Bowie into a thriving export-oriented coal business so they could then sell their stake to another private equity fund or run it as a public company on the stock market," says Clark Williams-Derry, the director of energy finance at the Sightline Institute, a Seattle-based environmental think tank.
In its financial documents, Bowie outlined its plans to export through West Coast ports. But it glossed over a major problem: Few of the existing marine terminals in California and other West Coast states are capable of exporting the millions of tons of coal that Bowie's Utah mines could produce. A new terminal project in West Oakland, however, one equipped to handle coal, could provide the opportunity Bowie needed.
West Oakland, where the terminal would be located, hugs the eastern side of San Francisco Bay. Once, it relied on the 7,000 blue-collar jobs supported by the Oakland Army Base. But the base closed in 1999, and ever since, the neighborhood has struggled.
In an effort to rebuild the neighborhood's economy, the city of Oakland contracted with a private company, California Capital & Investment Group, to redevelop the old base. The Oakland Global Trade and Logistics Center would include a rail terminal, truck parking, warehouse space, a recycling center, and a bulk marine terminal. When the project was announced in 2013, the developer promised that coal was not part of the plan. Instead, the terminal would ship bulk goods like iron ore, corn, wind turbines and auto parts.
But last April, a small Utah paper broke a story that the developer had tried to keep under wraps: Four counties in Utah, where Bowie's coal mines were located, intended to invest in the proposed Oakland terminal, with the intent of shipping their coal out of it.
Opposition from environmental groups and West Oakland residents quickly mounted. In 2014, the nearby Port of Oakland had rejected a separate proposal from Bowie to build and operate a coal export terminal. This new proposal was equally unpopular. Surrounded by three major highways, an active railroad, and the fifth-busiest port in the U.S., West Oakland already suffers disproportionately from air pollution. According to the latest statistics, local asthma rates are 2.5 to 3 times higher than those of other Oakland neighborhoods, and many residents worried that coal dust could escape from the coal trains and make the problem worse.
Still, not everyone was opposed. Last December, Rev. Chambers attended a meeting at another church on Oakland's East Side, where a representative from the terminal developer promised that bringing coal through the area would create jobs without bringing new health and safety problems. Some people in the audience perked up.
Unemployment is high here, and thanks to Silicon Valley's booming tech industry, the neighborhood is undergoing a housing crisis. Rental prices in San Francisco have risen so much so that people are now snapping up property in West Oakland, driving up rents for the mostly poor working-class families who live there. To many of those gathered at the meeting in the church, the coal export facility sounded good, recalls Chambers, "a way to contradict all the hardships."
Kevin Barnes, one of the other pastors at the meeting, said the facility offered hope to unemployed people. "I'm not an environmentalist," he later said. "But I support this project because I believe some jobs can come in — all they're asking for is a chance."
It wasn't the first time Utah counties had tried to fund transport for their land-locked coal; as early as 2001, several counties sought to build a 43-mile railroad connecting a coal transfer terminal near Salina, Utah, with the Union Pacific Railroad south of Nephi, Utah. The purpose of the line, known as the Central Utah Rail Project, was "to provide rail access to local industries, primarily the Southern Utah Fuel Company (SUFCO) coal mine owned by Bowie Resources," in order to move bulk cargo to other parts of the country. But the railroad plan would only work if it included a port from which to export the coal. By late 2014, the counties' efforts — backed by Bowie — were focused on securing access to the proposed Oakland bulk terminal, enabling them to ship goods such as salt, grain and hay — and especially coal — to overseas markets.
Soon after, Jeffrey Holt, an advisor to the counties who served simultaneously as chairman of the Utah Transportation Commission and as an investment banker with BMO Capital, organized visits to the proposed Oakland terminal site for Sevier and Carbon County officials.
For both Bowie and Holt, there were huge financial incentives: The terminal offered a way to sell millions of tons of Utah coal abroad and could earn millions of dollars for Holt's investment firm, BMO Capital. (The terms of the loan include a $3 million "strategic advisory" fee.) At a meeting in early April 2015, four of the counties involved in the rail line proposal — Carbon, Sevier, Emery and Sanpete — asked Utah's Community Impact Board for a $53 million loan in federal Mineral Leasing Act (MLA) payments to help finance the terminal, with the remaining $200 million to be raised by private investors. The loan money would come from Utah's MLA proceeds, which, under federal law, are intended to fund public works projects in communities impacted by mining.
The loan was approved, but at least one Community Impact Board member, Uintah County Commissioner Mike McKee, expressed concern about the legality of funding a private out-of-state development with MLA money. "The mineral lease law itself says the priority of funding is for infrastructure, planning and community services, with priority of those funds going back to the area of impact," he told the Moab Times-Independent. "One of the concerns that I had is I don't think that Oakland, California, is really returning (funding) to the area of impact."
As criticism mounted over the loan, county officials urged the Utah Legislature to enact a new funding scheme designed to evade the MLA's funding limitations. The result was Senate Bill 246, which swapped $53 million in federal MLA funds with $53 million in state transportation funds to provide money to finance the export terminal.
Many of the bill's supporters, including Utah Gov. Gary Herbert, who signed it, had received campaign contributions from Bowie. The company declined to comment on its involvement in the Oakland terminal for this article.
In a letter to U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, environmental and government watchdog groups raised doubts about the exchange's legality and the potential ethical violations involved in the campaign contributions, calling for a formal investigation.
Potter, however, believes the legal and ethical concerns are unfounded; he focuses instead on how the ability to sell Utah's coal overseas would help revitalize Carbon County's economy. The return on investment, he estimates, could bring in millions per year for the four counties, boosting local budgets.
Given the coal industry's precipitous decline, however, that optimism can appear tenuous. Nationwide, coal consumption has declined by nearly a third since its peak in 2007, when it was the dominant source of U.S. power. Over the past five years, the international benchmark prices for coal have fallen by more than 50 percent. Meanwhile, the prospect of booming markets abroad has begun to fade. China has started burning less coal, and imports have shrunk accordingly. Other Asian countries, especially India, have developed new coal supplies, driving prices down even further. Many of the private equity firms that invested on the promise of overseas markets have had trouble finding new investors and buyers for their coal assets.
Even Bob Murray, the CEO of coal giant Murray Energy, who has filed more than a dozen lawsuits over federal climate change policies, admitted that politicians should stop setting unrealistic expectations for coal's big comeback. "I don't think it will be a thriving industry ever again," Murray said. "We'll hold our own. It will be an extremely competitive industry and it will be half-size. … The coal mines cannot come back to where they were or anywhere near it."
It's still unclear what Oakland's decision to ban coal exports will mean for the terminal — whether the developer will raise enough money to build it for other products or decide to challenge the city's decision in court, like the proponents of the proposed Morrow Pacific terminal did in Oregon after state regulators denied the project a key permit.
"It's very hard to actually kill a project until proponents give up," says Williams-Derry. And the coal market is likely to continue to fluctuate, even as its future dims. Small rebounds like one this May, where China's coal imports increased slightly for the first time in 22 months, may be enough "to keep proponents' dreams alive until something bigger changes," he says.
For Oakland, though, last month's vote to ban coal exports signaled a new approach. Air-quality conditions in the polluted port neighborhood have improved, thanks to new laws regulating emissions. During the Paris climate negotiations last year, Oakland was recognized for its efforts at reducing greenhouse gases and black carbon emissions from trucks diesel ships. After struggling so long to improve his community's air, Rev. Chambers, like many of his neighbors, feels allowing coal exports would be a step back.
Still, he feels badly for places like Carbon County that have hitched themselves to a single commodity. "They're struggling, too," he says, and West Oakland can empathize.
Like Carbon County, Chambers' community needs jobs, but not, he believes, at the expense of human health. All four of Chambers' children developed asthma, and the family spent a lot of time when they were growing up at the hospital.
Keeping coal out of Oakland is about more than protecting his neighborhood. For Chambers, this is why the fight matters: the stuff we put in the air isn't just local, it's global. "When we keep it [coal] in the ground, it helps people in Utah, and it helps people in China, too."
Sarah Tory is a correspondent for HCN. Follow @tory_sarah]]>
This shortcut isn't for everyone, naturally. It's off-limits to anyone with a criminal history, and you must be willing to have your fingertips scanned or the pupils of your eyes photographed. But it allows you to avoid the time and hassle of waiting in long lines to have your boarding pass and identification checked by the Transportation Security Administration people, although you still have to take off your belt and shoes and remove your laptop.
But for a bribe of $179 per year, paid to a company called CLEAR, you can cut in front of the hoi polloi who were slogging through the endless line when you got there, and go directly to be scanned. Yes, this is a government-sanctioned service. Notoriously corrupt, underdeveloped Third World countries have nothing on us.
Chatting with an employee of the company in Denver, I was told that the proceeds will be split between the company and the TSA. Or maybe it was the airport; I'm not sure. But whoever gets the money, it's just plain wrong. After all, these are public enterprises selling private privileges.
I understand the concept of paying extra for enhanced service, and I have no problem with it. On planes, first-class travelers sprawl, taking up as much space as Wyoming, while those of us in economy get to inspect the skin pores of people in adjacent seats. And at a restaurant, you can buy a cheap glass of wine that smells like nail polish or splurge on one with the kind of fragrance that will have your date starry-eyed. We all understand that such things have a price.
But going through security is not an elective. This is a federal requirement. There should be no opportunity for somebody to be able to cut the line. Bribery shouldn't be flagrantly promoted.
Something of the same sort occurs at ski areas. Nearly all of the ski areas across the West are on public land, operating under permits from the U.S. Forest Service. The Forest Service thinks of itself as a partner with private companies in providing public recreation. As such, the private companies are allowed to charge for various services. The key charge is for being transported uphill.
I'm OK with that, and with $12 hamburgers, for that matter, and $300 per day ski instructors. You're still free to throw a bologna sandwich in your pack, and you can teach yourself to ski.
But not all customers are equal. At some ski areas, for an added fee, you can get first dibs on untracked powder in the morning, before the regular lift service starts. The Forest Service and its partners provide access to recreation, but those with more money get more access.
Then there's the custom of cutting lift lines. Ski instructors commonly go to the front of the line and politely inquire if they and their customers can cut in. But there's an underlying economic component. People pay handsomely for ski instructors to teach them how to ski better and select appropriate terrain. But for many customers, the ski instructor's key value lies in not having to wait in line. This is the equivalent of cutting to the front of the lunch line in middle school, even if it's done more politely. If ski areas were barely meeting payroll, you could argue that selling these special privileges was justified. But most ski areas are extremely profitable. So what is the rationale for offering such preferential treatment to people with deep pockets?
Some people see tolled highway express lanes in the same way. If you want to avoid the creepy-crawling congestion in the other lanes, you can hop into the express line and scoot along — for an added cost. I think this is different, though. Because we refuse to raise gas taxes, the express lanes provide a way of paying to fill the potholes in the many roads that all of us use.
In a bizarre way, resentment of this kind of privilege was a common theme overlapping the political campaigns of both Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. (That might be the nicest thing I can find to say about Donald Trump.) They came at it from different angles, though. Each tapped a sense of dissatisfaction with various systems – including political parties – that are often perceived as rigged.
Petty bribery in less-developed nations seems to be a way of life. There, they do it with a wink as cash passes under the table. Here, it's something that's advertised.
In the western Colorado town of Grand Junction in late June, canaries were there, too — in a way. At a Bureau of Land Management hearing to collect public input on coal-leasing reform, dozens of middle-aged men and women and their families wore bright yellow T-shirts with the word "Coal" printed on them. They, too, were warning of danger: the decline of the coal mining industry, due to a combination of market downturns and strict environmental regulations. Coal miners across the West are already facing job cutbacks and layoffs.
I eavesdrop on a conversation about boom-and-bust economies. This one is different, some say. "The science is undeniable. Without question, we must divest from fossil fuels to curb climate change," says Joseph Stein, a clean-cut, Boulder-based Climate Reality Project intern with a #KeepItInTheGround sticker on his white shirt. Bill Jardon, a coal miner who lives in Eckert, about an hour's drive to the southeast, just shakes his head.
Here, on the state's westernmost edge, two visions of the future are colliding. The "Keep it in the Ground" movement wants to ensure a sustainable climate future; the "Keep the Lights On" group hopes to protect jobs in coal communities.
The hearing, one of the three such gatherings taking place around the West, is the latest action in a three-year process meant to reform the BLM's coal-leasing program, which hasn't been rehashed in nearly four decades, since the Nixon administration. The agency is reviewing the current program and collecting input on what exactly coal leasing in the 21st century should look like. The goal is to determine when and where to lease, how to ensure fair returns to taxpayers if royalty rates are adjusted, and how to better account for environmental and public health impacts.
The reform comes on the heels of global pressures for climate change action and a transition away from fossil fuels such as coal to limit greenhouse gas emissions. In 2015, nearly 200 nations met in Paris to sign a landmark agreement to enforce regulations that would accomplish that, and in January this year, the Obama administration ordered a moratorium that halted future federal coal leases until further notice.
No one is sure how reform might impact the industry. But coal companies and the communities that depend on them regard the timing as suspect, and many of the people I spoke with see leasing reform as a threat to an already struggling industry. As the two groups gather in Grand Junction to debate the future of coal, stakes have never been higher for the disparate visions for the future of energy to power the world while balancing the consequences of climate change.
On the street in front of Grand Junction's Avalon Theater, where the coal hearing is about to start, a crowd has gathered, waiting to go inside. Cars slow as they pass; drivers honk at miners waving signs — "NO COAL= NO LIGHTS"; "COAL. IT KEEPS OUR LIGHTS ON." Pam Eaton, a senior director of The Wilderness Society, is preparing her comment. "Coal has been transitioning for a while, and everyone is looking for someone to blame the decline on — environmental groups, federal regulations — but the market has been driving it out outside of those influences," she says. Stu Fraser, former mayor of Telluride, Colorado, jumps in. "Some think it's a callous argument that doesn't think about the coal communities," he says, gazing toward a nearby group of yellow shirts. "But we're here to argue for funding to ease the transition for rural towns and job-training for coal miners."
There's a strong sense of community among the coal miners and their families. Cresta Campos, a Hispanic woman with long dark hair, is here with Yasmin and Julian, two of her four children. Both kids wear bright yellow shirts, and Julian's falls far below his knees. Campos has worked as a coal miner for more than a decade, supporting her family with her salary. She lives in Hotchkiss, a small rural community in Colorado's North Fork Valley, which has depended largely on coal mining for nearly 120 years. "I worry about keeping my job. I worry about the schools as other miners leave and take their families with them. There are less children," she says. "If I lost my job, we would have to leave."
When the hearing begins, at around 10:30 that morning, more than 200 people pack into the auditorium's seats. Five BLM staffers sit at a long table on the stage. County commissioners from Colorado and Utah open the forum, mostly advocating for the economic interests of their communities.
The first person of 160 to walk to the microphone to speak is a man named Jeremy Nichols. The climate director for WildEarth Guardians, Nichols has become known as one of the fiercest advocates for transitioning away from coal. He arrived in Grand Junction at 4:30 that morning to grab the first spot in line. Nichols wanted to set the tone for the hearing, he said. "I knew the coal mining industry presence would be very strong," he told me later. "I wanted to make sure the message was clear: It's time to transition from coal. It's going to be painful, it's going to be difficult, and we want to do it in a way that helps these families and won't decimate their communities, but we must transition."
Kathy Welt, a tall woman with a formidable stage presence and voluminous voice, delivers her comment on behalf of Western coal families. Welt, an environmental engineer for Arch Coal's West Elk Mine in Somerset, says there's nothing wrong with the current coal-leasing program. Any changes to it, she warns, would come at a high cost to tax payers and communities. "Please consider the impacts on real families right here, right now." When she finishes, the crowd erupts in whooping whistles and applause. The BLM staffers listen quietly.
By the time the comment period nears its end, eight hours later, more than 150 commenters have shared their stories. The biggest question, however, remains unanswered: How can we replace coal but continue to power our world without leaving rural communities high and dry?
People pour out of the auditorium to congregate along the sidewalks, where they lean against building walls and talk. Despite the civil discourse between coal miners and environmentalists that has defined the day, I see the usual cliques quickly re-form. Environmentalists walk off down the sidewalks, their notes now tucked under their arms. Coal miners gravitate to others in bright yellow shirts, their eyebrows furrowed. Like canaries, they have delivered their warning of the danger they see coming to coal country. And then I watch them slowly drive away.
Paige Blankenbuehler is an editorial fellow at High Country News. She tweets @paigeblank]]>
Just five years ago, approximately 1,200 people in the North Fork Valley were employed by three local coal mines: the Bowie No. 2 mine, outside Paonia (High Country News' hometown), and the Elk Creek and West Elk mines, both about nine miles up the road in Somerset. Now fewer than 250 people remain employed, says Kathleen Welt, an environmental engineer at the West Elk Mine in Somerset. The Elk Creek mine has shut down permanently and Bowie No. 2 is idled, leaving West Elk as the sole coal producer in the valley.
In early May, a prominent silo at Oxbow's Elk Creek Mine in Somerset, Colorado, was demolished. While production had long ceased at the mine, the toppling was a poignant symbol of the coal industry's demise. | Video produced by Jay Canode.
The decline of coal jobs on Colorado's Western Slope is just one more example of reverberating layoffs across the West and the rest of the country. In April, Arch Coal and Peabody Energy announced 465 layoffs at two major Wyoming coal mines. Meanwhile, both behemoths, along with Alpha Natural Resources, which operates coal mines in Wyoming's Powder River Basin, have declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Historically low natural gas prices mean that the fuel has been out-competing coal, and stricter environmental regulations make it harder for coal companies to stay in business. And many companies have been hurt by questionable business decisions and high executive salaries and bonuses.
While the cutbacks may be necessary to meet climate goals set by the Obama administration, in total, according to HCN data compiled from local media and energy industry reports, more than 2,600 coal-mining jobs have disappeared since 2012 across the West. The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not track industry or geographically specific unemployment data, but according to the agency's census of employment statistics, employment within the coal industry in the West has declined by more than 4,000 jobs. "Those jobs offer the ability to sustain your livelihood and keep your family here," says Welt, who had been laid off in the past, and rehired by Arch Western Resources in 2009. "When those jobs fade, so do communities. There's nothing equitable to (a coal miner's job) in the valley. A lot of people can't afford to stay, so — they leave."
For coal miners out of work, Western states have done little to provide a safety net; so far there are no statewide programs that provide re-training, counseling or economic development strategies for extractive resource dependent economies. Some coal companies offer laid-off workers a severance package, but former miners have few options to gain positions that match their previous salaries — on average, more than $80,000 a year.
To explore our map, hover over individual coal mines for more details on recent layoffs. View specific operators and their respective facilities by highlighting a company name in the legend. Search geographic locations using the magnifying glass in the upper left corner. To return to original view, click the home button on the map view.
This data is part of ongoing High Country News coverage on transitioning energy economies and Western coal mines that are facing cut-backs, closures and layoffs. The following data has been compiled from local media and industry reports, and is necessarily incomplete.
Are you aware of job cuts not reflected in our map? Please help us by filling out a tip form so we can complete our dataset on Western layoffs.
Paige Blankenbuehler is an editorial fellow at High Country News. She tweets @paigeblank]]>
U.S. District Judge Scott Skavdahl held that the BLM doesn't have the authority to regulate hydraulic fracturing in federal oil and gas reserves, where tens of thousands of wells have been drilled in recent years, most of which are fracked. The same judge temporarily blocked the rule last year pending this decision.
Colorado joined Wyoming, Utah, North Dakota, the Ute Indian Tribe and industry groups in opposing the rule, which would impact drilling for oil and gas on lands managed by the BLM, U.S. Forest Service and even where the government owns the minerals under private property. "This case has never been about whether we should regulate hydraulic fracturing. As a state, Colorado is doing so effectively and responsibly," Attorney General Cynthia Coffman said in a press release. "This case is about holding the federal government accountable when it ignores the law."
The ruling was the most recent setback for the Obama administration's efforts to curtail environmental damage from fossil fuels. The Supreme Court earlier this year stalled the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan, designed to slash greenhouse gas emissions from the electricity sector, pending its review.
In the case of the BLM fracking rule, the Obama administration didn't immediately announce whether it would appeal the ruling but lawyers on both sides said an appeal is all but certain.
At the heart of the Skavdahl ruling was his finding that BLM had "attempted an end-run" around the 2005 Energy Policy Act, in which Congress explicitly restricted the EPA from regulating fracking under the Safe Drinking Water Act. But defenders of the rule, including some legal scholars, counter that the judge got it wrong because Congress was referring to a different law and a different agency.
What's at stake is not just part of President Obama's environmental legacy but also the balance of power between the federal government and the states with regard to federal lands management in the West.
"That's exactly the problem here; for 100 years BLM has never just let states manage oil and gas drilling on federal lands. Congress made BLM manager of oil and gas drilling on federal lands to protect the environment," says Mike Freeman, the lead Earthjustice attorney representing environmental groups in the case.
Although some states argued that their rules are as protective or more protective than federal rules, the BLM and environmental groups assert that the agency's rule would tighten protections for groundwater. For example, it would require that companies store large quantities of water mixed with hydraulic fracturing chemicals in closed tanks rather than in open pits after the fluids flow back up from wells.
In its rule, the BLM said storing these fluids in open pits creates risks of polluting the air and water and harming wildlife. The tanks, by contrast, "are less prone to leaking, are safer for wildlife, and will have less air emissions." (Six of the nine states impacted by the rule do not require tanks, and the remaining three — Colorado, Utah and Wyoming — require tanks in some circumstances, according to BLM's survey of state rules.)
Another way the BLM and environmental groups say the BLM rule is more protective is that companies would be required to tell the agency before they fracked. Companies would be required to ensure that a barrier layer existed between underground water supplies and the formations where they planned to inject fluids under intense pressure to make cracks in the rock (or tight sands) to get the oil or gas flowing.
Recent research linking contamination of groundwater to hydraulic fracturing in Pavillion, Wyoming, cited a lack of a barrier layer as one reason for the contamination.
Industry groups opposed the requirement to use tanks, saying sometimes pits are the better and more environmentally friendly solution. They also argued that the BLM rule would require companies to disclose hydraulic fracturing strategies without protection for their trade secrets. "That's the essence of competition in the oil and gas business," said Mark Barron, a lawyer representing industry in the case.
Industry representatives also argued that the BLM had failed to show that fracking needed to be regulated. "The risks to groundwater are statistically insignificant,'' Barron added.
The immediate impact of the ruling is not likely to be substantial because drilling has plummeted in the West due to low prices for oil and gas. Still, Barron and others in the industry said that not having the BLM rules on the books will make it easier for companies to resume drilling as prices increase.
"It matters more than ever. It changes the economics of when drilling will be affordable again. We're at a point where every dollar counts," Barron said.
In New Mexico, for instance, where most of the drilling takes place on federal land, the number of drill rigs dropped from 100 in 2014 to 20.
Defenders of the rule hope to get a response from the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals by the end of the year. But even if the appeals court overturns Skavdahl's decision, that may not be the end of it. The appeals court likely would send the case back to Skavdahl, who had a long list of problems with the BLM fracking rule and could find another reason to again strike it down. For instance, in his 2015 decision to temporarily stay the rule pending his final ruling, Skavhahl cited concerns that the BLM failed to adequately consult with tribes.
"The Tribe is already effectively regulating fracking and all other aspects of oil and gas production, and adding yet another layer of regulation would only have driven production to off-reservation locations. We are pleased that the District Court has struck this misguided BLM rule," Shaun Chapoose, chairman of the Ute Indian Tribe Business Committee, said in a statement.
Although the judge didn't decide that issue in his ruling last week, he could if the appeals court overturns him. "There are still other things that the judge did not like," said Jeffrey Rasmussen, an attorney for the Ute Tribe. "We could go back and forth a few times."
If you're standing on one of the many ridges, mesas or mountaintops here in Western Colorado, it's likely you're standing on a vast reserve of natural gas.
In early June, the U.S. Geological Survey released a new estimate for reserves of natural gas in what is called Piceance Basin, which lies beneath a huge swath of the region, which includes the region from Grand Junction to Gunnison. The USGS says there's 66 trillion cubic feet of recoverable reserves—about 40 times more than earlier estimates. That would make it the second-largest reserve in the nation.
And that has some people nervous.
"A fellow walked in who was under contract on a property scheduled to close yesterday and he was kind of in panic mode," says Mike Jackson, a realtor in Paonia, where property values are climbing, but where the loss of coal jobs could mean hardships for the economy to come. "'Do I stay or do I go?' It is on the minds of people."
Such reactions could be unwarranted. While the USGS data reflect a significant increase in potential natural gas, that doesn't mean a rush of new leases for drilling or hydraulic fracturing. Those have more to do with market forces than the amount of available gas, says David Noe, a former Colorado Geological Survey geologist and board member of the Western Slope Conservation Center. "What's happened with this report is it's reflecting the success of the industry," Noe says. "The industry has been so successful at producing oil and gas at this point and it's been done in such a fast way; it really has been a boom."
Noe says that many leases in Western Colorado were gobbled up in the previous boom — and now the industry has bottomed out. "Now there's too much on the market and the prices go low. The economics of drilling in the ground mean everything to an oil and gas company," he says.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the market price for natural gas nationwide is $2.40 per thousand cubic feet. Most industry analysts believe the price needs to be at least $6 for development to break even. What's more, the USGS numbers merely confirm what the industry already knew.
The new numbers could be significant in the long run, however, says Alex Demas, a spokesman for USGS. They mean Western Colorado has the potential to produce oil and gas for a long time to come. That does not mean that oil and gas development will replace jobs lost from the closure of North Fork Valley coal mines, which provide large salaries to highly skilled workers.
For opponents of fossil fuel development, the new numbers should not be an open invite for more development. Alex Carr Johnson, executive director of the Western Slope Conservation Center, says the economic gap left by coal won't be filled by more extractive industry.
"The local coal mines have provided a huge amount of wealth here locally for the last 100 to 120 years, and that is (largely) gone. There is a huge appeal to look at the next extractive industry to replace that huge hole in our economy, however the oil and gas industry would provide very short-term gain and short-term economic value and wouldn't be providing that support for generations of families to live here."
In other words, the new numbers mean there's more gas underneath us, but they don't say much more. For people in a valley looking for economic answers, there are few here.
Paige Blankenbuehler is an editorial fellow at High Country News. She tweets @paigeblank]]>
Absent any substantive evidence that ranchers are radicalized, opponents of public-land grazing are reprising the argument that ranchers are subsidized. This is a lesser evil, to be sure, but still a serious charge. Does the American taxpayer dole out dollars so ranchers can graze public lands on the cheap?
It is a fact that ranchers pay less for grass on public land. Currently, they pay $2.11 per AUM, compared to about $18.40 per AUM for private leases, where one "animal unit month" equals the forage necessary to graze a cow and calf or five sheep for one month. Yet the complaint that public-lands ranchers get a sweetheart deal ignores the hidden costs of grazing on public lands. Economic studies concur that when other expenses are factored in — maintaining fencing, water development and invasive weed treatment, for example — the cost of grazing on public land is the same or possibly greater than grazing on private land.
Though federal grass itself may be cheaper, the expenses of running cattle on public lands make it anything but a bargain.
Yet the federal grazing program in 2014 operated at a $125 million shortfall. If taxpayers are annually sinking that kind of cash into it, what are they getting for their dollars?
The answer is far more than they realize. Consider, for example, that ranchers provide invaluable services like volunteer firefighting on public lands. Fire is the single most destructive force on America's public rangelands: In 2015, range fires ravaged over 700,000 acres in the West and cost the Bureau of Land Management $131 million for fire suppression and land restoration.
The total price tag for Idaho's 280,000 acre Soda Fire alone will top $73.5 million over five years. Yet few people are aware that across the Great Basin, rancher-run Rangeland Fire Protection Associations mobilize as first responders to range fires, often extinguishing blazes hours before federal fire crews can arrive on site. In Idaho alone, 146 rangeland protection firefighters fought 56 fires last year. Just by preventing one major fire, these ranchers provide taxpayers untold savings. Beyond that, you can't put a price on the value of the watersheds, wildlife, and vital habitat for sage grouse and other sensitive species that ranchers protect from wildfire.
And for those of us who would rather see ranches instead of condo developments that swallow up open spaces, a recent study ("The Disappearing West") funded by the left-leaning Washington, D.C., nonprofit Center for American Progress, found that between 2001 and 2011, a staggering 4,300 square miles of natural areas in the West were lost to development. The study found that "development on private lands accounted for nearly three-fourths of all natural areas in the West that disappeared." If the study has a moral, it's this: To preserve the natural splendors of the West, we must find ways to keep undeveloped private land from residential, commercial and industrial development.
How? One way is to support public-lands ranching. The 250 million acres of federal grazing lands are integrally tied to the economic livelihood of individual ranches, which apart from their federal grazing allotments comprise 100 million acres of mostly natural, undeveloped private lands. If these ranches are able to stay in business, that's 100 million acres of open space, habitat and ecosystems spared from the developer's bulldozers. Put a price tag on that, if you can.
Today, many environmental groups understand the critical role that ranchers play in the conservation of the West. The World Wildlife Fund's Sustainable Ranching Initiative, Audubon's Working Lands effort and The Nature Conservancy's numerous partnerships with ranchers all show that the custodianship of ranchers is highly valued. Teamwork and collaboration have come to define 21st century conservation on Western rangelands.
Grazing systems can and should be fine-tuned. But land, once developed, is lost forever. If American taxpayers value landscapes unbroken and unburned, they should tip their hats to the ranchers. These hard-working men and women aren't on "welfare." They are fundamental to the welfare of America's wide-open West.
He could not have picked a friendlier setting for his speech than Bismarck, North Dakota, a hub of the oil and gas industry. Trump vowed to reinvigorate the nation's energy businesses, particularly coal mines, which have seen dramatic declines in recent years, triggering layoffs of tens of thousands of miners.
"We're going to save the coal industry. We're going to save that coal industry, believe me," Trump said during a press conference before his speech.
Trump also asserted that he would reduce regulations on hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the engineering technique that has helped spark a resurgence of the U.S. oil industry in recent years.
But many economists and industry experts caution that there's a central contradiction in Trump's vision. He pledges to revive the coal industry, and at the same time boost the main culprit that has eviscerated coal, natural gas. "It's really what's eating coal's lunch in the United States," says Susan Tierney, a Denver-based industry consultant and former assistant secretary of the U.S. Energy Department. "It is nonsensical for him to claim that he can undo the market forces that are undermining the coal industry today."
Trump's energy policies stand in stark contrast to the visions of Democrats Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. Both promote big shifts towards wind and solar power and argue that keeping more coal in the ground is an important way to fight climate change. Sanders has promised to work towards a national ban on fracking.
In North Dakota, Trump contrasted his energy policies with Clinton's, lambasting a comment she made to CNN in March that she would put coal miners out of business. She later apologized to miners during a campaign stop in West Virginia. "She's worse than Obama," Trump said. As he has in the past, Trump blamed the Obama administration's environmental rules for the coal industry's suffering.
When a reporter pressed him about how he planned to bring back coal jobs, he stressed that he would do so by getting rid of regulations. "You know, all I can do is free up the coal, which I'm going to totally do. Get the companies back to work, market forces, that's something I don't want to get involved in… To me, a market force is a beautiful force," Trump said.
But economists and energy experts counter that easing regulations would not be enough to reinvigorate coal, especially not if Trump removes regulatory impediments to natural gas at the same time. That's because, so far, Obama-era regulations, such as the Mercury Air Toxics rule, have played a secondary role in coal's precipitous downward trajectory.
Even coal industry CEO Robert Murray – whose company Murray Energy Corp. owns mines in Utah, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky and West Virginia – says he explained this to Trump in a recent meeting with the candidate. "He wants to bring the mines back and I told him that was not possible," Murray told S&P Global Market Intelligence, a research company that publishes market analyses. "I don't think it will be a thriving industry ever again… The coal mines cannot come back to where they were or anywhere near it."
But Trump says he's hearing a lot of complaints from the mining and electricity industries about regulations. And while many experts stress that low natural gas prices have been the biggest factor so far, the Energy Information Agency says it has not created a specific ranking of the factors contributing to coal's downturn, including environmental regulations and low natural gas prices. "The two are somewhat intertwined," says Chris Namovicz, the Energy Information Agency's acting team leader for electricity analysis. "You probably wouldn't be seeing as big an impact from low gas prices without the environmental regulations, and you probably wouldn't be seeing as big an impact from the regulations if gas prices were higher."
(Some experts counter that these regulations are in part about saving society money by preventing coal-related air and water pollution, which result in medical and clean up costs. Tierney also points out that Trump says he wants to bring back coal and also protect clean water and clean air – a further contradiction.)
President Obama's Clean Power Plan, designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the electricity sector nationwide, would be expected to hurt coal. The Supreme Court stayed that rule pending review, but Namovicz says the prospect of that rule also may be adding to coal's current troubles.
However, some economists are convinced that low natural gas prices have played the dominant role in coal's slide. There's a strong correlation between falling gas prices and the decline in coal production. What's more, while you can blame the retirements of some older coal plants on regulations, it's harder to fault regulations for the day-to-day decisions of grid operators to increasingly opt for natural gas instead of coal.
Two economists, University of Colorado associate professor Daniel Kaffine and North Carolina State associate professor Harrison Fell, have been crunching data from every fossil-fueled power plant in four different regions of the country. They're trying to quantify the relative roles that low-cost natural gas and the rise of solar and wind have played in coal's negative trajectory.
They found in most of the regions studied that natural gas prices played a dominant role, and the growth of wind played a sizable secondary role. Regulations trail both.
"Banning fracking would be one mechanism to make coal competitive," says Kaffine. But instead, Trump promises to remove regulations for natural gas too. "That's just going to put even more downward pressure on coal."
So the coal industry is still waiting to hear from Trump about how he would bring back jobs. Luke Popovich, a spokesman for the National Mining Association, says, "I certainly would like to hear some details on what exactly a new president might do to undo regulations that are impacting coal, let alone what he might do in the marketplace to restore employment." He adds, "I don't think anyone is satisfied that he has a plan to achieve what he promises." On that, there seems to be widespread agreement.
Elizabeth Shogren is HCN's Washington, DC, correspondent.]]>
Overgrown and insect-infested forests aren't unique to the Trinchera Blanca Ranch, known locally as simply the Trinchera. But its response has been uncommon. Last fall the ranch began seeking state and local approvals for a timber mill that could take wood off its ailing forests. It's currently under construction and slated to open for test runs this fall. If it opens according to plan, the mill could help improve the health of the Trinchera's forests and boost the struggling economy of Costilla County, where it could become the largest private employer. The mill's influence could also extend down the Sangre de Cristos Mountains into New Mexico and to a small part of the San Juan Mountains thanks to its capacity to handle both small diameter timber and larger-scale timber sales.
When Ty Ryland went before the Costilla County commissioners for land-use approvals for the mill, he emphasized that the need to heal the Trinchera's ailing forests was driving the proposal.
Fire suppression, which was common on forests throughout the American West for much of the 20th Century, had increased the density of the Trinchera's stands. Low-elevation forest types that had historically adapted to ground fires had been clogged with fuel and risked being engulfed by more severe burns. A 15-year drought also made the ranch and other regional forests vulnerable to wildfires, like the 2006 Malo Vega Fire, which scorched 13,780 acres on the Trinchera. That blaze forced the evacuation of nearby subdivisions and the temporary closure of U.S. 160.
During the three years after the fire, debris flows off the burn scar also triggered multiple closures of the highway where it heads up the western flank of La Veta Pass. It's not just fire that afflicts the Trinchera's forests — insects are a problem, too. Spruce budworm is the main pest on the ranch, and spruce and other bark beetles also kill trees. Spruce, Douglas fir and subalpine fir are all subject to infestations, which can impair tree growth and regeneration.
"We've always had problems with spruce budworm, ever since I can remember," said Ryland, who grew up on the Trinchera and has lived there since 1969. "Concerns about fire have always been an issue."
The ranch has conducted logging and thinning to the tune of about 700 acres per year, which amounted to less than one percent of the ranch's 89,000 acres of forest. But those treatments were limited by the fact that no local mills had the capacity to take more logs off the Trinchera. Nor did they have the ability to handle small-diameter trees, Ryland said.
Now, though, the ranch is in position to pick up the pace of forest thinning and establish a mill. According to Ryland, that's because of Bacon, a hedge fund manager who sits on Forbes Magazine's list of the country's 400 richest people, and who bought the ranch in 2007 for $175 million.
Bacon's presence is felt up and down the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. In addition to the Trinchera, he owns a 21,000-acre ranch in neighboring Las Animas County as well as Taos Ski Valley. Roughly half of the timber going to the mill would come off the Trinchera, which would double the amount of treatment to 1,560 acres annually. The other half of the mill's timber feed will come from outside the ranch.
Ryland estimates the mill could take in timber from an 80-mile to 90-mile radius before the cost of hauling the timber would become prohibitive. The mill will have a capacity of 10 million to 20 million board feet per year, depending on whether the mill can sustain a second daily shift. It will also be able to take in trees as small as 5.5 inches in diameter off the ranch, and trees from outside the ranch as small as six inches in diameter.
One big question: whether the Trinchera mill will be able to process enough outside timber to have an impact on regional forest health and employment. Like the Trinchera, the Sangre de Cristo Mountains stretching to the south of the ranch are privately owned.
But that stretch of forest is home to lands that have already been logged or landowners who haven't been interested in logging in the past, said Adam Moore, a district forester for the Colorado State Forest Service. Across the state line, the Sangre de Cristos in New Mexico also contain a good deal of private forest.
Ernie Lopez, a district forester for the New Mexico State Forestry Division, said bark beetles and other infestations haven't reached epidemic levels. Still, the pests, along with crowded stand conditions, are a problem. "In general there's a need," he said. "There's a lot of area that hasn't been thinned."
Should the mill find willing private landowners or successfully bid on a Carson National Forest timber sale, it would have the capacity to handle larger sales. That could be a major boon to the region's struggling timber industry. "We are very limited in process facilities," Lopez said. "We don't have anything major on the west side of the mountain."
But a new mill is no panacea. Across the San Luis Valley in the San Juan Mountains, the region's most obvious forest health problem won't be healed by the Trinchera mill. Spruce beetles have chewed their way through 588,000 acres of spruce stands on the 1.8 million-acre Rio Grande National Forest. There are almost no spruce stands left for the bug to infest, so thinning would do little to halt their immediate spread.
While some thinning could protect Forest Service campgrounds and roads, the remote, high-elevation spruce forest that often sits just below tree line is not subject to the same density of home building that takes place at lower elevations.
Still, the salvage logging of large-diameter trees that has made up most of the Rio Grande's recent timber program in recent years may convey economic benefits to both the mill and the U.S. Forest Service. Kirby Self, who oversees the national forest's timber program, said if the mill were to begin bidding on the Rio Grande's sales, the added competition could boost auction prices. Past sales on the southwestern corner of the forest have been limited by the amount of wood that existing bidders could handle, Self said. The added capacity of the Trinchera Mill could help increase salvage logging from that section of the forest.
But the mill may make its biggest impacts in the pocketbooks of Costilla County, traditionally one of Colorado's poorest counties. The mill would employ about 40 workers if it operates on a single shift, and up 70 if it can add a second one.
Those figures might not grab headlines in a city. In Costilla County, however, which has just 3,500 residents and the state's fifth-highest unemployment rate at 5.9 percent, the new jobs could make a big difference. Bob Rael, director of the Costilla County Economic Development Council, said the mill would also fill a void left by the 2014 closure of the Chevron molybdenum mine in northern New Mexico. "I think that's going to be an important addition to Costilla County," Rael said.
This story is part of the "Small towns, big change" project through the Solutions Journalism Network.]]>
You'd be surprised how many uses a horse catheter has. Just ask Tori Hellmann, a science teacher at Palisade High School, in western Colorado. In her classes this year, she's using one to demonstrate fracking. She injects plaster of Paris through the catheter and into a plastic bottle of gelatin, busting the Jello apart.
"So it kind of simulates the idea of fracking," says Hellmann. "Not exactly, but it kind of gets the image across to the students so they can see that by using a fluid in a solid, you can get it to actually crack."
Hellmann got the idea last summer, when she took a course developed by the University of Colorado's AirWaterGas project and funded by the National Science Foundation to help teach students more about the impacts of fossil fuels. The environmental impacts of the fossil fuel industry can be a polarizing topic of conversation, especially in communities that depend on oil, gas and other extractive industries. But the new program is helping Colorado science teachers weave fossil fuel discussions into their classrooms – even in towns where it can be a touchy subject. Hellman was one of eight science teachers from several oil- and gas-producing counties in Colorado to go through the course. The development class lasts for six weeks online, before concluding with a two-day, in-person workshop.
Lisa Gardiner specializes in teacher training with AirWaterGas and helps coordinate the course.
"The reason that we're gearing the course toward communities that have a lot of oil and gas development is that this is a great opportunity for place-based science education and that it can make science and engineering real and relevant to students," says Gardiner.
She says fossil fuels provide a good example of a local issue with a far-reaching impact.
"The students in these communities can understand how their local environment is related to all these science and engineering processes, and then it also scales up, and we talked about global climate change caused by the burning of fossil fuels as well," Gardiner says. "So it's a good example too of looking at something on a local scale that has a global impact."
That kind of curriculum can be tricky in places where jobs depend on the fossil fuel industry. Wyoming lawmakers, for example, recently battled over science standards in schools, fearing that too much climate change curriculum would damage the economy.
In Palisade, many students have parents who work in the oil and gas industry. But Hellmann—who grew up in the coal town of Craig, Colorado—says her students have generally kept an open mind. She says the key is to focus on objective facts, tested by science. The class mostly discusses fossil fuel impacts on air and water quality, but also touches on some related social and economic issues. These kinds of activities help students stay informed.
"That's probably the biggest takeaway I would hope that they get, is 'Be informed,'" Hellmann says. "They're our future voters and you know that these are going to be issues in this state, so hopefully this will give them some background to want to be educated."
Hellmann is well aware that the fossil fuel industry is a thorny topic, with costs and benefits that need to be considered.
"But there are times when you do share your opinions and I think that that's OK for them to be aware of too," she says. "Because again, I grew up in a coal-mining community with the power plants, so I know how that can impact a whole city."
The statewide program faces an uncertain future, with no funding currently lined up beyond this year.
Hellmann, though, hopes to make the subject into a full course someday, instead of just a couple units throughout the year.
She'll keep using horse catheters, she says, though she's not sure everyone will.
"I can only imagine what people do when they see that that's what they have to buy. … It makes kids realize, or everybody goes, 'Oh my God, that thing's big!' So it's kinda like, oh, not so much fun for the horse, but it works well for this."]]>
The 10-mile reach, known as Portland Harbor, became a Superfund Site in 2000. Over the last century, ships were built and decommissioned here, chemicals and pesticides manufactured, petroleum spilled, and sewage and slaughterhouse waste allowed to flow. Pollution has decreased, but toxic chemicals linger in sediments. Resident fish like bass and carp are so contaminated that riverside signs warn people against eating them, though some do. And osprey can't read warnings, so they accumulate chemicals, which can thin eggshells and harm chicks.
Among the worst are polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs. Used in electrical transformers, coolants, caulk, paints and other products, these probable carcinogens were banned in 1979 for their toxicity, persistence and the ease with which they escaped into the environment. Even so, they continued entering waterways through storm drains here and elsewhere.
The Environmental Protection Agency's remediation plan for Portland Harbor's PCBs and other pollutants, expected in May, will cost between $790 million and $2.5 billion. The city of Portland, one of 150 "potentially responsible parties" on the hook for a percentage, has already spent $62 million on studies and reports. So on March 16, the city council decided to join six other West Coast cities in suing agribusiness giant Monsanto to recoup some past and future cleanup costs. San Diego filed in 2015, and San Jose, Oakland, Berkeley, Spokane and Seattle followed.
Monsanto is best known for GMO crops and Roundup, but before it split from its chemical and pharmaceutical branches (also named in the suits), it was the sole U.S. PCB manufacturer from the 1930s to the late 1970s. "Monsanto knew that if you used (these products) for their intended purpose, PCBs would leach into the environment," says Portland City Attorney Tracy Reeve, but it sold the chemicals anyway. "We believe that polluters, not the public, should pay."
A victory would not only inspire more PCB lawsuits, it could suggest a pathway to help fill gaps in U.S. chemical regulation, says University of Richmond School of Law professor Noah Sachs, who specializes in toxics and hazardous waste. The 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act, inspired in part by PCBs, has a weak review process and generally doesn't require health and safety testing of chemicals before manufacturers can sell them. And the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act — CERCLA, the Superfund law — is concerned with who spilled or arranged to dispose of chemicals at a site, not who made them. "What we see here is testing a new legal theory," Sachs says. "I hope companies that know their hazardous products are escaping into the environment are held accountable for the damage they're doing."
The cases' novelty arises from their application of state public nuisance laws. Each seeks to prove that Monsanto compromised public use and enjoyment of waterways by marketing and selling this class of chemicals while well aware of its dangers. The Seattle complaint, for example, cites internal memos from the '60s in which company officials discuss PCBs as "an uncontrollable pollutant," noting their global spread and harm to people and wildlife. There is "no practical course of action that can so effectively police the uses of these products as to prevent environmental contamination," a Monsanto committee wrote in 1969. "There are, however a number of actions which must be undertaken to prolong the manufacture, sale and use of these particular Aroclors" — the company's trademarked name for certain PCB compounds.
The cases follow on a stunning 2014 victory in the Superior Court of California. There, a judge found three companies had created a public nuisance by marketing and selling lead-based paint while knowing its health hazards, and ruled they should pay $1.15 billion into an abatement fund to remove it from homes. The Monsanto cases likely have a stronger public nuisance claim, says University of California Davis environmental law professor Albert Lin, because, unlike residences, "waterways are clearly public resources." Monsanto's role as sole manufacturer also simplifies efforts to connect the company to contaminated areas.
Nonetheless, "the plaintiffs face an uphill climb," says Peter Hsiao, an environmental attorney for international law firm Morrison & Foerster. The lead paint case is being appealed, he notes, and similar lead paint lawsuits failed in six other states. Attempts to use public nuisance law to address climate change, with California going after automakers, for example, have also foundered. Still, he worries a win could have an unintended chilling effect on innovation, "depriving society of the enormous benefit that comes from the safe and effective use of chemicals."
First, though, the lawsuits must reach trial. Monsanto has been filing motions to dismiss each case — arguing that it never had a manufacturing presence on the West Coast and never discharged anything there. The first motion, against San Diego, will be heard in court May 25. "The allegations … are without merit," Monsanto spokeswoman Charla Lord wrote in an email. If "companies or other third parties improperly disposed of (PCB) products and created the need for the cleanup of any waterways, then they bear responsibility for the costs."
Contributing editor Sarah Gilman writes from Portland, Oregon. Follow @Sarah_Gilman]]>
"I never leave home, so I am way, way out of my comfort zone," he says. "But this is really important to me. If these mines were allowed to developed, it would be devastating to the economy of Park County because we depend so much on the pristine beauty of the area and tourism."
Wells met up with Tracy Raich, an energetic real estate broker whose husband is a mining engineer, and Colin Davis, who owns the century-old Chico Hot Springs Resort. The trio met with senior Obama administration officials and Montana senators, had breakfast with Montana's whole congressional delegation, and even hosted a reception at the National Geographic Society, which is featuring Yellowstone in its May issue.
Wells and the others represent Yellowstone Gateway Business Coalition, a group of nearly 200 businesses small and large in Park County that is raising a ruckus about two mining companies that have applied to explore for gold north of Yellowstone. The companies intend to start by exploring on private land but any prospective mines would likely affect the surrounding public lands. The coalition asked the Interior Department for a three-year emergency withdrawal of the public minerals, a federal action that would prevent any new mining or exploration, surrounding the private inholdings in Custer Gallatin National Forest. They called on their senators and representatives to press their cause and introduce legislation for a permanent withdrawal.
"There are just some places that are too special to dig or drill, and the front porch of Yellowstone Park is one of those places," Sen. Jon Tester, D-Montana, told High Country News in an email following his meetings with the group. A spokesman for Sen. Steve Daines, R-Montana, stressed that the senator grew up in Bozeman, spending his weekends in the backcountry in the area but didn't state his position on the withdrawal.
The groups' success in landing so many high-level meetings reflects the cachet that Yellowstone, the nation's first national park, has in Washington. But the mining companies have entrenched power on their side as well. The 1872 Mining Act, which still largely holds sway, gives hardrock miners the right to claim federal land for mining purposes and mine without paying any royalties. It would take action by the Interior secretary, president or Congress to withdraw public minerals from mining, although the state of Montana regulates exploration and mining on the private land, where the companies have requested license to explore.
The Montana Department of Environmental Quality currently is doing an environmental analysis of an exploration proposal near Wells' cabins in Emigrant Gap from Lucky Minerals, a Canadian company. The draft analysis is due out this summer, according to spokeswoman Kristi Ponozzo. As for the other operation, Crevice Mining Group LLC, the department found problems with its exploration proposal and sent a letter in April advising the company that it would have to reapply before it could get a license to explore. Tammy Johnson, executive director of the Montana Mining Association, underscored that these companies are merely exploring for gold at this point, saying it was "premature" to suggest what kind of mines they might contemplate.
"The mine permitting process is pretty rigorous in Montana. Should anyone decide they want to build a mine, there is a substantial process they need to go through to do that," said Johnson.
Efforts to reach Crevice were unsuccessful, but Shaun Dykes, vice president of Lucky Minerals, told High Country News that "given the site is the location of heavy mining activity in the past and the potential sources of jobs and revenue, should exploration be successful, it makes no sense to withdraw these lands. They sure are not unique and pristine wilderness." His company's plan is to explore on private land and if it is successful in finding gold, would seek permission to explore on public land. But as for the withdrawal, he adds: "We would fight tooth and nail for our rights."
The emissaries for the Yellowstone Gateway Coalition don't deny their area's mining history, but they say their region has chosen a new path that's not consistent with large-scale mining. Wells lives right on Emigrant Creek, where mining trucks for the Lucky Minerals' project would have to drive on what's now a one-lane dirt road. His wife's family came to this area in 1873 to mine gold and her parents had to get up before dawn to get water before the dozens of families surviving the Depression by mining upstream caused the water to turn the color of chocolate milk. The hills, once bare from mining-era timber-cutting, are still scarred from earlier failed efforts at gold extraction.
"But God has repaired the canyon. It's healed," Wells says. "You can lay on your belly next to the creek and get a drink. The water is so clean and pure, and we're fighting to keep it that way." As the land has grown back up over scars, climbers, skiers, ATV and horseback riders have come to recreate there. Wells now takes his guests hiking on the Forest Service land where Lucky Minerals has staked claims.
Today, Park County's economy is based on tourism, and many business owners see the requests to explore for gold as a threat to their livelihoods. "It's a precursor to a disaster," says Davis, who employs 170 local people at his resort. "It's going to tear our way of life apart."
The group released an economic analysis for their county that estimates anglers spend $70 million a year to fish on the Upper Yellowstone, most of that money going to Park County businesses. Hotels and restaurants bring in the most money to the county and owners worry the mining could chase tourists away.
Conservation groups fighting the gold mining projects hope that if the federal minerals were withdrawn, it would not be economically viable to develop just the private inholdings. "Our belief is that mining companies would lose interest in mining on that smaller scale," says Jenny Harbine, an Earthjustice lawyer.
Jeff Krauss of the Bureau of Land Management said his agency listened to Wells and the others from Park County but has not taken action. Lucky Minerals early this year cancelled a proposal to explore on Forest Service land after learning the agency would require an environmental analysis.
But Lucky Minerals still has more than 100 claims, each covering about 20 acres, on federal lands, which may complicate the coalition's effort to get a withdrawal, according to Robert Grosvenor, a minerals administrator on Custer Gallatin National Forest. Crevice also has claims to minerals on federal land. Before withdrawing minerals, the federal government must prove there are no valid existing claims. Grosvenor says that's not easy. The Forest Service is still trying to prove that some claims are not valid in an area that President Clinton withdrew from mining in 1996. "We would only withdraw the parts that Lucky didn't hold claim to," Grosvenor says. That may have the unintended consequence of driving up the value of Lucky's claims. "I don't see (the withdrawal) being an effective tool at this time," he said.
Still Wells and his traveling companions hope that although they may not be able to stop the exploration and possible mining on private lands, a withdrawal could limit the scale of any eventual mines.
"Every corner of Montana is behind this, from our senators to our coffee shops," Davis, 60, says.
Raich, 55, says the group isn't anti-mining, but believes their community, so near Yellowstone, is not the place to do it. "My mining husband agrees," Raich says. "Right now his company is doing gold mines all over the world. He's working on one in Montana. But they're not prospecting near national parks for goodness sake's. That's not the respectful, appropriate way to provide resources for the world."
Elizabeth Shogren is HCN's DC Correspondent. Follow @shogrene]]>
Nevada is in the process of reinventing itself as a state, from the home of gambling to the West's latest tech and manufacturing hub. At the center of that transformation is Lance Gilman, a man who has transformed himself multiple times. Gilman worked in the music industry in his early career, then got into real estate in the 1980s. He has owned and sold everything from boat marinas and McMansions to his latest bet: 100,000 acres of dusty mountain ranges in northern Nevada, called the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center (TRIC).
Gilman is both the county commissioner and the largest land-owner in Storey County, where TRIC is located. So far he has attracted more than 120 companies to the area, most notably Tesla, but he has room for hundreds more. Fun fact: In order to shore up the county's tax base and keep TRIC afloat, a few years ago Gilman purchased Storey County's legal brothel, the Mustang Ranch. Learn more about this modern-day prospector in the latest episode of Range.
Range podcast produces stories of the New American West and is co-hosted by reporters Amy Westervelt and Julia Ritchey. Photo by Kyle Roerink/The Las Vegas Sun/AP]]>
We are a tiny David compared to Harmoni Spice of Zhengzhou, China, the largest importer of Chinese garlic, and Christopher Ranch in Gilroy, California, the primary distributor of Harmoni's garlic. Harmoni and Christopher Ranch are the Goliaths of our industry.
All we did was file a formal request with the U.S. Department of Commerce for an administrative review of Harmoni Spice's anti-dumping rate, which is "zero." Duties are imposed in this country on some 300 products to raise the price of imported products so that they are closer to domestic prices. A rating of "zero" means that no duty is imposed.
At over 19 million metric tons a year, China is now the world's largest producer of garlic, while the United States is down to a mere 175,000 metric tons. Currently, the wholesale price of garlic in China is $1 a kilo, and this has enabled Harmoni Spice, the only garlic importer that pays no duty, to undercut U.S. producers for the past 10 years. Anti-dumping duties, which can run as high as $4.71 a kilo, would serve to level the playing field for U.S. producers, bringing the price of imported garlic in line with U.S. wholesale prices.
Harmoni maintains its zero duty rate through a loophole in Commerce Department regulations, which allows an "interested domestic party" of "like product" to ask for an administrative review and then to withdraw its request for that review. This is where the loophole comes in.
Every year for the past 10 years, the California-based Fresh Garlic Producers Association, of which Christopher Ranch is the largest player, has first requested administrative reviews of a number of Chinese garlic importers, and then, just at the deadline, withdrawn Harmoni Spice from the process. The result is that Harmoni's zero rate gets rubberstamped without review. Until now, no other growers have contested the situation, presumably for fear of tangling with the garlic Goliaths.
Ted Hume, a trade attorney with 40 years' experience, moved to Taos with his artist wife last summer, after staying in the B&B on our garlic farm. On my behalf (and later with Boxcar Farm), he filed a request for administrative review.
We expected some pushback, but Harmoni's lawyers have buried us in some 2,000 pages of filings with the Department of Commerce. They also filed what is patently a SLAPP suit – a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation – against a total of 21 defendants, including us. Recently, both Avrum and I were visited by a private investigator, who claimed he wanted to grow garlic in Texas. We didn't believe him.
The lawsuit and Harmoni's filing with the Department of Commerce are attempts to get us to withdraw our review request and thereby enable Harmoni to retain its zero anti-dumping duty rate. We think Harmoni is attempting to interfere with our constitutional right to petition the government for redress of grievances. And we realize that this may be a long, drawn-out battle, but we're hoping it will end in a level playing field for U.S. garlic growers.
Perhaps a larger issue is that that other U.S. producers have gamed the import duty system in a similar way, allowing them to profit from the funneling of cheap Chinese goods, both agricultural and manufactured. The Department of Commerce, in short, may be allowing millions if not billions of dollars to slip through taxpayers' fingers, destroying countless jobs in the process.
As trade attorney Bill Perry told the Los Angeles Business Journal, "The whole system certainly smells to high heaven."
International trade law is an arcane subject, seemingly remote from everyday life. But every time you stop into a Wal-Mart or Family Dollar, you're already knee-deep in it. And it is certainly true whenever you buy supermarket garlic. Think before you shop. Garlic should add flavor to life, not be part of a system that "smells to high heaven."
Thumbnail image courtesy of Flickr user ilovebutter.]]>
"Its downfall was there's no market to legitimize the construction of the infrastructure – the railroad and the mine both," says Clint McRea, 54, a rancher who would have seen nine miles of the railroad built on his property if the project went forward.
The demise of the Tongue River Railroad is a window into a major upheaval the railroad industry is facing, due to the downturn of coal in the Powder River Basin and elsewhere. For decades, coal has been a mainstay of the freight railroads in the West. The emergence of the Powder River Basin as the nation's largest coal field was thanks in large part to the deregulation of the railroads in 1980, which made rail shipping cheaper and meant low-cost Wyoming coal could compete with higher priced coal from Appalachia, Illinois or Colorado, according to Robert Godby, a University of Wyoming economist. Coal made up nearly 40 percent of the freight by weight carried by rail and almost 20 percent of rail revenue in 2014, according to the Association of American Railroads.
Consequently, recent bankruptcies of several major coal companies and the decline of coal production have had major repercussions for freight railroads: Coal shipments have plummeted, thousands of workers have lost jobs, rail companies have started holding off on projects like the Tongue River Rail Road and are streamlining their track networks because of lower traffic. For example, BNSF is in talks with unions to stop using its terminal in Sheridan, Wyoming. Coal shipments in that part of its network are down 50 percent compared to last year. Crews would be transferred to Gillette. Company-wide, BNSF has furloughed 4,600 workers, about 10 percent of its staff, since last year.
He expects that, with his seniority, he'll be able to keep working for BNSF but will have to commute 100 miles each way to Gillette. "I'll do what I have to do to weather the storm."
Declaring that the country is in an "energy depression," Matthew Rose, BNSF's executive chairman, told an energy summit in Billings, Montana, earlier this spring that the sting from coal is even greater when combined with the drop in oil shipments. "The weakness in the coal business was masked by the offsetting growth in crude by rail. Now that oil prices are low, the real impact of declining coal is being felt," Rose said.
While oil shipments likely will pick up when prices rise and drilling increases, the railroad industry recognizes that coal's slump may be permanent. "At the end of the day, coal is declining at a very steep rate and that means a significant shift in what our freight railroad will move," Rose added.
Railroads had hoped that Powder River Basin coal would find new markets abroad, which would have kept coal trains running even as the U.S. demand for coal shrank. But protests on the West Coast, where rail lines terminate, have blocked efforts to build new coal terminals for sending Powder River Basin coal to Asian markets. "The permitting process has become a weapon to stall or to stop new projects," Rose said, referring to long-delayed coal export terminals proposed in Washington State.
The other main railroad carrying Powder River coal, Union Pacific, has faced similar disruptions. Plummeting coal shipments was the big theme of a gloomy first-quarter earnings call that Union Pacific held with industry analysts last week. Union Pacific's workforce company-wide was down 11 percent compared to last year, driven largely by a 43 percent drop in revenues from coal shipments compared to the first quarter of last year.
Shipments of Powder River Basin coal were down 38 percent. Shipments from mines in Colorado and Utah were down 35 percent, according to Eric Butler, executive vice president for marketing and sales.
Company officials acknowledged that they had failed to predict the downturn and forecasted that the decline will likely continue for the immediate future and beyond. Stockpiles of coal at electric generating stations are enormous—enough coal to supply electricity for 108 days, 41 days more than last year at this time—because of the unseasonably warm winter and low gas prices.
"Coal is going to continue to have difficulty," Lance Fritz, Union Pacific chairman, president and chief executive officer said on the call. "It's not going back to where it was four or five years ago."
That means railroads are looking for new products to take coal's place. BNSF, for instance, touts its expertise in shipping parts for wind turbines. "Last year we moved almost 2,400 blades in a single year," Rose says.
Elizabeth Shogren is HCN's DC Correspondent. Follow @shogrene]]>


text:
Tori Spelling's Husband Dean McDermott Challenges Twitter Basher to MMA Fight
Canadian-American actor Dean McDermott's latest tattoo did not only get his wife, actress Tori Spelling, tweeting about it but it had apparently also gotten him in an MMA fight. The 'intimate' tattoo that got everyone talking was the tattoo that a certain guy named Anthony Bracco made fun of on Twitter, and he's going to have to pay for it heavily inside the ring in a real match with McDermott.
"Dean got a Tramp Stamp and I tweeted LMAO and he challenged me to a fight. Lets get it on!" was the tweet from Bracco that kick started the Twitter war. The two exchanged tweets for almost a week, with Bracco further provoking McDermott with messages like, "We all know Tori wears the Pants.... Tori do you mind if I knock your husbands block off?"
Finally, McDermott had enough already and he challenged Bracco to an actual fight, posting, "Dude. Put your money where you're mouth is. Lets get in the ring man. You talk a lot of shit. Lets throw hands. Bitch." The fight is going to take place on October 5 in Los Angeles, to be featured as one of the fights in Celebrity Boxing, as set by its founder Damon Feldman, but instead of boxing, the two are going to engage in a mixed martial arts match.
Making the fight more interesting is major league baseball athlete Jose Canseco, who has volunteered to train McDermott for the fight. The match will be three two-minute rounds and has been turned into a fundraising match that will benefit autism.
- 'The Walking Dead' Was Supposed to End in Alexandria, but It Has Changed
- Disney's New 'Nutcracker' Movie Casts Mackenzie Foy as Clara
- Video: Kanye West Disses Taylor Swift While Crashing Drake's Concert
- Ben Affleck Risks His Life in New 'The Accountant' Trailer
- An Uber Driver Failing to Recognize Lorde Brags About Another Celebrity Passenger
- Scott Disick and Khloe Kardashian Make Fun of Dating Rumors While Posing for a Selfie
- Demi Lovato and Joe Jonas Bring 'Camp Rock' Back to D.C. Concert. See Their Onstage Reunion
- Is Lindsay Lohan Really Pregnant? See Picture of Her Smoking in Sardinia

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Enter your mobile number below and we'll send you a link to download the free Kindle App. Then you can start reading Kindle books on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.
Getting the download link through email is temporarily not available. Please check back later.
To get the free app, enter your mobile phone number.
Learn more
In Praise of Prejudice: The Necessity of Preconceived Ideas Hardcover – August 10, 2007
|New from
|Used from
See the Best Books of the Month
Want to know our Editors' picks for the best books of the month? Browse Best Books of the Month, featuring our favorite new books in more than a dozen categories.
Frequently Bought Together
Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought
Editorial Reviews
About the Author
Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
Customer Reviews
Top Customer Reviews
Looking at the "thoughts" of contemporary men in the street, he sees, sadly, the unintended, distorted consequences of Descartes' and John Stuart Mill's thinking, as it has filtered down to the masses. It would appear from their defiant bumper stickers and proffered rationalizations for bad behavior that contemporary men have become largely their own carvers. Shrewdly and wittily, Dalrymple asks whether thinking out everything for ourselves each day, while rejecting the past and all authority - such modern men's apparent social "philosophy" - is, in fact, a societal ideal of any real worth, or just a ground for social deterioration. Should every person take nothing on authority to the point of daily reinventing the wheel? Should the mind of an adult be just a perpetual tabula rasa? Dalrymple thinks, in our commendable zeal not to be unduly narrow or overlook any new evidence, we may have forgotten the difference between being genuinely open-minded and being merely empty-headed.Read more ›
And such great sentences. After a short introduction to a ten line extract from Rene Descartes, Dalrymple opens the next chapter with this marvelious sentence: "We may inquire why it is that there are now so many Descartes in the world, when in the seventeenth century there was only one." The explanation of this sentence and its consequences proceeds. The last sentence of this two page chapter goes: "Then all the resources of philosophy are available to them [skeptics] in a flash, and are used to undermine the moral authority of custom, law, and the wisdom of ages."
The book requires careful reading and attention as each sentence must be intellectually unpacked but it is worth it. So much insight and so much wisdom for so few dollars.
In modern America (and probably many other parts of the Western world), the term prejudice has become so ridiculously linked with a negative connotation that it takes courage simply to write a book with this title. Yet as Dalrymple demonstrates, prejudice is not only warranted in our daily lives, it is necessary. Our world is so large and complex that anyone attempting to live his life by only believing those things which he himself has proven to be true, without influence of others, i.e. without prejudice, would be too crippled to perform even the most rudimentary functions in our society.
IN PRAISE OF PREJUDICE is broken down into small chapters exploring the necessity of prejudice, the inability to truly rid oneself of it (as removing one prejudice would simply lead to a new one) and the folly of even attempting to do so. Dalrymple makes an excellent point that removing one prejudice does not, ipso facto, lead to some better outcome. Often, indeed usually, the results of abandoning prejudices lead to a worsening of some situation or another. After all, there is a good reason why prejudices in favor of our own families, against sexual promiscuity and so forth, developed in the first place.
Given this, it is, Dalrymple convincingly argues, nothing short of cruel to fail to instill various prejudices in people from an early age.Read more ›
Dalrymple points out the real reason behind the modern popularity of the idea of the totally free-thinking individual: we don't want any restrictions on our actions but rather complete license to do whatever we please. The modern embrace of the pure rationalism championed by the likes of Descartes and Mill is simply an excuse for a philosophical disputatiousness that rejects all authority regarding moral behavior, whether that authority is religion, history or social convention. Custom and etiquette are diminished, and society thus loses important regulators of anti-social behavior, whether it's illegitimacy or littering. Without self-policing of one's behavior, the law is the only force that can mediate the resulting rights conflicts, and thus it should not be surprising that the government's power grows to the point of authoritarianism.Read more ›
Most Recent Customer Reviews
This book appears in the Encounter Books "Brief Encounters" series—29 small chapters (ca. 4 pp. each), a hit and run reflection on an important subject, done in an attractive,... Read morePublished 7 months ago by Richard B. Schwartz
Theodore Dalrymple is a brilliant scholar and I find his perspectives fascinating and informative.Published 9 months ago by Ty
I can't recommend this book enough. It squarely pinpoints what has gone wrong in our culture. In the name of liberation from oppressive social and religious systems long in... Read morePublished 9 months ago by Randy Travis
Vintage Dalrymple, but not quite as readable as his usual output. Would recommend his "LIfe at the Bottom" prior to reading this, as it would be helpful for becoming... Read morePublished on March 7, 2014 by Stephen L. Clark
I know the title of this book is off-putting. Prejudice is a dirty word, immediately invoking images of segregated lunch counters and hooded Klansmen. Read morePublished on July 19, 2012 by Paul Mastin
I have to say that Theodore Dalrymple and David Stove have become my two favorite authors in recent years. Read morePublished on November 8, 2011 by Geoff Puterbaugh


text:
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — State officials say $110 million in no-bid health contracts that are now the focus of a criminal investigation bypassed two routine oversight boards for deals of that size.
The Austin American-Statesman reported Tuesday that the lucrative contracts with Austin-based 21CT skipped those reviews while avoiding a bidding process. The tech company was hired to help the Texas Health and Human Services Commission root out Medicaid fraud.
A spokeswoman for the state comptroller says it's unclear whether the bypassed reviews violated state law.
Two high-ranking state health officials resigned this month as scrutiny over the contracts intensified. Three others were sent home on paid administrative leave.
Public corruption prosecutors in Austin are preparing to open a case. Health Commissioner Kyle Janek has said he doesn't believe anyone acted illegally.
(© Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
Latest News:
- Tough Texas Woman Fights Off Snakes With Her Bare Hands
- Dottie Pepper On PGA Championship: 'A Very Intimidating Layout'
- Fort Worth Firefighters Give Young Cancer Patient Day To Remember
- Gang Member On Texas 10 Most Wanted Sex Offender List Caught
- Texas Attorney General's $100K Gift Came Despite Agency Rules
Top Trending:


text:
Films that offer profound philosophical lessons are a rarity. I remember watching The Matrix several years ago, noting that the movie was really a sci-fi version of Plato's "Metaphor of the Cave," which posits that most people are living in a false reality of shadows. More...
In speech of her life, Clinton promises a 'clear-eyed' vision
Why Bill Clinton's Hebrew Hillary button resonated
SodaStream hires hundreds of new employees in southern Israel
State Department 'deeply concerned' by Israel's new settlement construction plans
Why do Israeli politicians always seem to be under investigation?
Tag: Inception
View the most popular tags overall?
'The Adujustment Bureau': Finally, an Action Thriller for Religious Thinkers
March 8, 2011 | 5:00 pm
Lessons from "Inception"
February 1, 2011 | 7:05 am
"Inception" delivers the mind-blowing it promises, and from start to finish is worth the watch.
Quite a few friends have mentioned that they had a hard time figuring out what exactly was fact and what was not, within the story. They found it hard to keep up with the action, or to...


text:
Format Maps
Featured Content
- Map of the Yellowstone National Park, showing routes and ...
- [Map of cavalry engagement near Bridgewater, Va. Oct. 4th and ...
- Hazleton, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.
- [Sketch of the battles of Chancellorsville, Salem Church, and ...
- [Base map of Alabama].
- Great Smoky Mountains National Park
- [December 23, 1944], HQ Twelfth Army Group situation map.
- A capital do Brasil.
- Extract From A Map Entitled Portions Of The Military Departments...
- This map of the peninsula between Delaware & Chesopeak Bays,...
- Beijing and vicinity.
- Sketch-book of positions of forces of 2nd Corps A.N.Va., ...
- Map of the United States of America : with the contiguous ...
- Map of the tourist routes, Yellowstone National Park.
- Williams' commercial map of the United States and Canada with ...
- [Sketch of the battles of Chancellorsville Salem Church, and ...
- The city of New York.
- Lloyd's American railroad map.
- Fort Worth, Tex.,
- Merrimac, Mass.
- Map of the battle field of Gettysburg. July 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 1863
- Chile.
- [August 26, 1944], HQ Twelfth Army Group situation map.
- [Rough sketch of the Rich Mountain battle area extending from ...
- Township and railroad map of Minnesota published for the ...
- [December 25, 1944], HQ Twelfth Army Group situation map.
- Annapolis, Anne Arundel County, Maryland.
- Proposed Great Smoky Mountains National Park
- To His Excellency Genl. Washington, Commander in Chief
- Battle of Monocacy.
Results: 1-1 of 1 | Refined by: Original Format: Maps Remove Date: 1600-1699 Remove Language: English Remove Part of: Library of Congress Online Catalog Remove Subject: Africa Remove
A description of the sea coasts ... in the East Indies
Covers the coasts of eastern Africa, India, and the East Indies. Relief shown pictorially. Each drawing bears a brief description with soundings, distances and facts regarding anchorages and navigation of rivers which might be of value in pirating activities. This atlas is known as the "Buccaneer atlas" because it results from the experience of Hacke in association with Captain Bartholomew Sharpe, the notorious Buccaneer ...
- Contributor: Hacke, William
- Date: 1690
Look inside: 105 results