The Oregonian has a story today about an infuriating and irrational decision by some legislators to plunder the state Energy Trust in order to pay off some of OMSI’s debt, a debt that was incurred before the Energy Trust fund was established. The Oregonian story says that budget writers couldn’t find more than $1 million [...]

Oregon’s target of 75% cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 is a step in the right direction. The principal problem is that it falls short of what the best science is saying we have to do (80%) to have better than a 50-50 chance of preventing dangerous climate destabilization.

From Business Week “The U.S. is completely unprepared for peak oil, as it’s called, and the wrenching adjustments it would entail could easily accelerate global warming as nations turn to coal (see BusinessWeek.com, 4/19/07, “Rx for Earth: Sooner Not Later”). Moreover, regardless of the implications for climate change, peak oil represents a mortal threat to [...]

A concise article on “The Great Biofuels Hoax.” Includes the memorable (and all-too accurate) phrase “bait and switchgrass” used to describe the biofuels boosters’ tactic of agreeing that, while biofuels aren’t actually useful now, they’re sure to be someday when cellulosic ethanol made from things like switchgrass come on stream.

Update:  The O reports that high hopes were unfounded.  The story doesn’t even mention any limits on it, so probably the patch to bar the subsidy for ethanol from corn (which Kevin suggested had been added and had support from all sides) was not included.  So welcome to Iowa West folks, spending $5M a year [...]

There’s an amazing study by researchers at Oregon State University (pdf file) that ought to be on every single desk in the Legislature and on every reporter’s computer as we get down to the short strokes in this session and the real heavy hits start getting laid down by lobbyists looking to deliver for their [...]

This announcement suggests that there was no business case for the ethanol plant in Klamath Falls and that the people of Oregon can be thankful that they are not going to be paying more in taxes to subsidize this plant even as the already critical water problems would have been made just that much worse. [...]

Great article with huge implications for Oregon is HERE, pointed out by the nice people at the Sightline Institute in Seattle: Some choice bits: Taxes Are Sexy So let’s stop being shy about saying what we want. View full article and comments here http://thetyee.ca/Views/2006/05/01/TaxesAreSexy/ By Zane Parker and Donna Morton Published: May 1, 2006 … [...]

James Woolsey, former US CIA boss, is spending his days trying to alert people to the problem our dependency on oil is creating. I attended an all-day workshop he ran called “Powershift 2020″ where different presenters proposed different things. Woolsey made clear his belief in biofuels contributing to the solution. So it’s especially interesting that [...]

… is that we never learn anything from history. Particularly political history. Environmental groups, the very people on the front lines of battling against the disasters caused by our perverse petroleum based ag system, have decided that rewarding the destruction of the land isn’t so bad, at least not if you can claim a green [...]