Oregon has always been a national leader in providing clean energy to ratepayers due to our hydroelectric dominated energy portfolio. In 2018, around 54% of Oregon’s electricity use resource mix was zero-emitting. The current renewable portfolio standard(RPS) does not reflect this reality. Oregon’s RPS was established in 2007 and created a requirement for how much […]
EPIC FAIL: Green Energy Collapses in Texas It was billed as the storm of the century, with bitterly cold arctic air covering Texas, all the way into Mexico. It became a Texas standoff at the OK Corral. Mother Nature was pitted against the heroes of modern electrical production: wind and solar. Who would ultimately survive […]
Should governments use taxpayer dollars to support select companies of their choice? The recent closure of SolarWorld’s Portland area solar panel factory and the failure of the government-backed SoloPower Systems show why public dollars shouldn’t be spent to subsidize private firms. SolarWorld opened the nation’s largest solar panel factory in Hillsboro in 2008.[1] It was […]
Recent freezing temperatures and power outages in both Oregon and Texas demonstrate why going “all in” on intermittent energy resources like solar and wind power will end up costing utility customers. Governor Kate Brown declared a state of emergency on Saturday, February 13, due to a snow and ice storm that left up to 300,000 […]
Returning to America in 1829, Jean Baptiste Charbonneau set aside his cultivated manners and fell into the rough-and-tumble existence of the mountain man. He ranged the length and breadth of the American West, hunting, trapping, guiding and exploring. Unfortunately, Baptiste maintained no diaries or journals, so information about his life is known only through the […]
The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service estimates up to 500,000 birds are killed annually in the United States due to wind turbine collisions. The number of deaths will continue to increase as more turbines populate our nation’s landscape. Raptors are especially vulnerable to colliding with wind turbines due to their flight patterns. They typically soar […]
Winter is coming to Oregon, and it might be a rough one. As if the pandemic, riots, and a recession weren’t enough, the Northwest is looking at La Niña weather conditions that will bring us a cold, wet winter. While most of us will tough it out in our warm homes, thousands of unsheltered homeless […]
As countless families struggle with schooling from home, one standout district is setting the bar higher and overcoming challenges presented by Covid-19 and remote learning. We’re told to listen to the Centers for Disease Control when it comes to handwashing, social distancing, and sanitizing, but why are Oregon education policy makers not listening to the […]
T.K. Foss never existed. He was a figment of the imagination of generations of sailors at the Naval Academy Prep School at Bainbridge Naval Station Training Center near Baltimore, Maryland. The details of his origin are lost in antiquity–probably sometime in the mid-20th century. At any rate, by 1961 he was established as one of […]
California, Oregon, and Washington have been aflame for weeks now, and Governor Newsom of California has identified the culprit: global warming. But he’s wrong – dead wrong – and as long as he thinks he’s right, he won’t do the things that are necessary to prevent more of his people, their homes, and their towns […]
