Utah’s New Office of Energy Development

by Michael Orton
Licensed through ImageProviders

SALT LAKE CITY –

Appearing on Tuesday before the Utah State House of Representatives’ natural resources committee, Rep. Roger Barrus (R-Davis) presented House bill 475 which, he said, “puts into place a new “Office of Energy Development in our state.” Along with the bill which easily passed his committee, Amanda Smith was introduced as the governor’s new energy advisor, assuming a role previously held by Dr. Diane Nielson whose background was in geology and mineral exploration. Presently overseeing both the Utah Department of Environmental Quality and the new energy development position, Ms. Smith will rely upon her background in law and her experience with public lands and conservation in the dual role until other appointees can be named. In an online press release issued Monday, the Governor's office indicated that his confidence in Ms. Smith was born from her ability to find common ground between a very diversely motivated group of stakeholders in a state with vast energy resources.

Rep. Barrus, an environmental engineer, testified that his bill “gives us the framework in which the Office of Energy Development can be created, and the governor’s energy advisor will appoint a director who will be over the office and will also appoint staff members as they are needed, but will do that within the existing budget.” This fiscal reality and the present-day limitations of Ms. Smith's assignment leaves the development of her newly created office wide open in a state which leads others in its efforts at economic recovery.

The governor's office had previously announced that his newest "energy initiative" would be available Wednesday, March 2, but late Tuesday the press conference scheduled for that purpose was cancelled until mid-March "due to scheduling conflicts." The governor had been in Washington testifying before congressional committees on both healthcare and "The Impact of the [Obama] Administration's Wild Lands Order on Jobs and Economic Growth."

Video coverage of the committee hearing and testimony is available via ImageProviders.

Update

Ashlee Buchholz, who coordinates information for the governor on this topic, indicates that his latest energy initiative document will now be released on March 18, 2011

Utah Governor to Roll Out Energy Initiative

by Michael Orton
licensed via Creative Commons

SALT LAKE CITY --

Ted Wilson, Utah Governor Gary Herbert's energy task force chairman, introduced Amanda Smith as the state's new "energy advisor" to a group of environmental stakeholders this morning and then both described their governor's latest energy initiative, scheduled to be released to the public on Wednesday, March 2. Ms. Smith, originally a Jon Huntsman, Jr. appointee, was previously the head of  Utah's Department of Environmental Quality and it was unclear if a new appointee to lead the UDEQ would be announced mid-week as well.

Noting that the original initiative draft from the 2010 meetings had been "pretty well beaten up by just about everybody" who held an interest, Wilson, a former mayor of Salt Lake City and avid outdoorsman, described the forthcoming document as Governor Herbert's "Ten Year Energy Initiative," and included the input offered at public hearings held throughout the state during the previous summer. Wilson stated that the revised initiative contained "a lot of renewables," but conceded that "not very many Americans are changing their way of life," leaving the activist stakeholders to wonder if this latest initiative would continue to favor commercial extraction industries. Utah is a major coal producer with significant natural resources contributing to its economic development even before it achieved statehood in 1896.

Lieutenant Governor Herbert succeeded Jon Huntsman, Jr. when the latter accepted an appointment by the Obama administration as ambassador to China in 2009. A realtor and former commissioner in Utah County south of Salt Lake, Gary Herbert was elected in his own right last November to a four-year term and came under significant criticism by the scientific community when he questioned the veracity of climate change last year. Wilson indicated that in the new initiative, Governor Herbert now accepts that he will be "governing the state on a warming planet."

Herbert is in Washington, D.C. this week, and many expect the republican governor to plea for the sovereignty of his state's public lands in testimony before a republican-dominated congressional hearing. That address is scheduled for tomorrow and Wilson said, "it will not be very nice" toward the Obama administration. The Bureau of Land Management currently oversees approximately 20 million acres in the state of Utah, and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has recently described the designation of "wild lands" creating uncertainties for future management and leases by the commercial interests of Utah's coal, oil and gas producers. Wilson also indicated that the new initiative addresses the state's position on finite water resources in a new era of energy development.

Ms. Smith added that the new initiative "looks pretty different than the 2010 draft." She described the substance of the document as a set of recommendations covering eight areas with guiding principles "that consider energy development and its public health, environmental and economic impacts, regardless of the type of lens through which those are viewed."

Addendum

At the conclusion of this 55 minute meeting, Mr. Wilson and Ms. Smith were asked if the new initiative contained any time-specific goals or objectives. They replied that it did not.

Whose Wilderness Is It, Anyway?

Utah includes nearly 20 million acres of public lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management  -- photo by L. Drake for MicroBureau West

Washington, D.C. --

The Department of the Interior has just announced a reversal of the "drill, baby, drill" and "no more wilderness" era that began with the Bush administration's policies on public lands more than 10 years prior. Last Thursday, Interior Secretary and westerner Ken Salazar announced that the Bureau of Land Management will have the authority to set aside large tracts of federally-owned land that may need special consideration as "wild lands." Congress would still have the last word on what areas would be deemed formal "wilderness status," and thus permanently protected from extraction use and other commercial development. Some people in the state of Utah apparently didn't hear that last part. Congress will still have the same authority to designate formal wilderness areas.

In Utah, where there are nearly 20 million acres that are federally administered by the BLM, there was an immediate knee-jerk reaction from state politicians eager to attack the Obama administration as has been their norm. Reaction in that state may prove to be premature, where the state's righters often don't wait to consume and completely acknowledge all of the facts. However, Utah Governor Gary Herbert was so angered by Salazar’s announcement, he phoned BLM Administrator Bob Abbey to rail against what the governor calls “political posturing.” Uh, kind of like the federal government did with the natives of Utah prior to 1847.

“This decision may unintentionally damage all of the goodwill that we have worked so hard to build between the state, local governments, the environmental community and federal officials,” Utah's Governor Herbert said. (source: the Salt Lake Tribune). Plenty of observers would describe the Utah governor's statements as disingenuous at best, given the history of Utah's animus toward the Obama administration during the past two years. Herbert must believe that his opinion on the matter really counts now.

The Utah Governor could examine the history of his land, which as a territory designated by the federal government of the United States, petitioned for statehood several times, finally being admitted in 1896 and named by its native people. The name "Utah" is a word from the Ute tribe meaning "people of the mountains." The people referred to in that language were the original inhabitants before United States came to be and before the arrival of mostly European settlers in 1847 during the nation's westward expansion. Many of Utah's emigrant families homesteaded its land with federal grants during the Cleveland administration.

The most recent wrangling on this land use matter involved a 2003 out-of-court settlement when then Governor Leavitt managed to wrest millions of acres from BLM purview and outraged environmental and conservation activists who feared unfettered extraction development. Salazar said of the 2003 settlement, "That should never have happened." Even so, a major development at Snow Basin was made possible by the generous privitization of public lands to Utah tycoon Earl Holding in preparation for the 2002 winter Olympics.

The recent announcement by Secretary Salazar became swift political fodder as Utah's U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch lept to the microphones to say, "I will continue to do everything I can to ensure that... the authority to designate wilderness stays where it belongs -- with Congress." This was purely political grandstanding to those who emphasized that the new designation still acknowledged congress' authority over the wilderness designation, effectively leaving that distinction unchanged. In addition, the BLM management personnel have been charged with the responsibility to include state and local authorities in the development of their management plans under the new policy. This is not a significant change, either.

For instance, with the new "wild lands" distinction, the BLM would have increased discretion regarding the development of roads and trails and even limited energy development or other activities in such areas, even if they "may impair wilderness characteristics." This is not often mentioned by the rabid state's rights people of Utah who many feel have overreacted to the announcement made by Salazar. Their neighbors and friends, working with the federal government, will undoubtedly continue to work with the rest of Utah's population even as they decry this recent action as a federal government "land grab."

Salazar said the new policy is in line with the BLM's multiuse mission of balancing recreational activities, livestock grazing and energy production with wild land conservation and preservation, all of which the state of Utah already enjoys. "Thousands of Americans make their livings from those public land uses," Salazar noted. "Wise stewardship isn't just the right thing to do, it's good for business and it's good for jobs."

Perhaps the Utah politicians have forgotten to include that part of the Secretary's remarks as they whip up a local frenzy over the "erosion of state's rights." The native tribal leaders of Utah have remained silent thus far.

Interior Sec. Salazar Responds to Sen. Bennett's Request

Utah via Washington, D.C. --

Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar has sent Utah Senator Bob Bennett an offer to review the 77 suspended oil-and-gas lease parcels that have been the subject of much debate in the west and in Washington. The hotly-contested matter has come to a head with Bennett's procedural delay of Sec. Salazar's undersecretary choice who requires senate confirmation.

Several of the controversial tracts can be seen from Utah's Arches National Park

Earlier, Sec. Salazar had nominated David Hayes as undersecretary, whom Bennett has admitted is "very qualified." But the process was held up this week by three votes in cloture, ostensibly because Bennett wanted more information and justification on the lease cancellations. In his formal response to Bennett dated this past Tuesday, May 12, Sec. Salazar indicated that his office has recently facilitated ten oil and gas lease sites covering more than 1.5 million acres of public lands within the United States and an additional 1.7 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico.

There are approximately 20 million acres of (BLM) public lands within the state of Utah, and only 77 leases have been cancelled by the Dept. of the Interior because of their proximity to National Parks and other sensitive areas. This concerned Senator Bennett from an ideological point-of-view, with many Utah state legislators joining the chorus.

When cabinet appointments were made by the incoming Obama administration, one of Sec. Salazar's first actions involved suspending the lease offerings in Utah's controversial and sensitive areas. Salazar, a former senator from Colorado, enjoyed a confirmation that was virtually free of objection or delay. He inherited a controversy from day one on the job with the Department of the Interior, which includes the Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service.

At the time they were offered for oil and gas leases, the tracts in Utah evoked rapid response from National Park officials, who claimed that the Bureau of Land Management hadn't contacted them prior to making the listings. Then, the National Park Service’s top official in Utah called the leases “shocking and disturbing” and said his agency wasn’t properly notified. Environmentalists called it a “fire sale” for the oil and gas industry by the departing Bush administration accompanied by prior campaign chants of "Drill, baby, drill."

“We find it shocking and disturbing,” said Cordell Roy, the chief Park Service administrator in Utah. “They added 51,000 acres of tracts near Arches, Dinosaur and Canyonlands without telling us about it. That’s 40 tracts within four miles of these parks.” The leasing process had also been clouded by the actions of Tim DeChristopher, an environmentalist who joined the October, 2008 bidding for the questionable leases as a self-described "act of civil disobedience."

In Tuesday's response to Senator Bennett, Interior Secretary Salazar emphasized that his undersecretary nominee (David Hayes) would be directed to respond to the concerns of all of the "stakeholders" in a "community forum in Utah" within the first 10 days of Hayes' appointment. Additionally, Salazar said that Hayes would be directed to review the administrative record on the 77 parcels and tender a report to congress by May 29th. That timeline would likely be suspended due to the political manuevering of Bennett and fellow senate republicans. The confirmation process is still ongoing, with senate majority leader Harry Reid vowing on Thursday that Hayes will be seated. "If I have to wait, I will, but David Hayes will be confirmed," Reid said.

Carrizo Plain School to Fly Air Quality Flags

San Luis Obispo County -
Headed west from the sunburned California town of Maricopa, a traveler on the Cuyama Highway, (state route 166) passes by the windswept portions of the Los Padres National Forest, and the small agricultural towns which serve the growers and farmworkers of this central California area. Not too far from Interstate 5, past the town of Cuyama, the road rises into the hills above the Carrizo Plain, where ranchers and farmers work alongside oil and gas interests that dot the landscape. Occasional pumps tap wells that have been providing water and oil for decades. Under a cloudless, moonlit night during the summer, the air is often lifeless and hot, just as it was nearly 300 years ago, and a traveler might rely upon air conditioning from their vehicle to remain comfortable.

Springtime near Carrizo Plain Nat. Monument, San Luis Obispo County

This week, the San Luis Obispo County Air Pollution Control District began a program to alert their citizens of the level of air quality in this sparsely populated part of their county. What makes the program here on the Carrizo Plain so unique is that it is largely a rural portion of the state and county and includes only 175 homes and a population of less than 300 people. At the Carrizo Plain School, located one mile west of Soda Lake on state highway 58, a colored flag is now flying to indicate the level of the area’s air quality, which also covers Carrizo Plain National Monument. With levels of air quality represented by six colors, (green means good air; yellow is moderate air quality; orange is unhealthy for sensitive groups; red is unhealthy; purple means very unhealthy and maroon is hazardous air) the program began this week including additional information continually available on the county's air quality website.

APCD officials indicate that the flag program will expand throughout the coming year to include other locations within the county.

White House Eases Pressure for Environmental Regulations

Washington --

The Obama White House Office of Management and Budget has conducted an interagency review moderating the effort by the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse gases too soon. On April 17, the Environmental Protection Agency under the newly appointed leadership of Lisa Jackson proposed an “endangerment finding” that carbon dioxide, the main emission of the combustion of fossil fuels, be included as one of the “greenhouse gases” to be regulated as pollutants. The proposal was widely anticipated by environmental activists and big coal interests alike.

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson

Citing concern that the EPA had not “undertaken a systematic risk analysis or cost-benefit analysis” when the proposed finding was released in April, the report from OMB said that “making the decision to regulate CO2 under the Clean Air Act for the first time is likely to have serious economic consequences for regulated entities throughout the U.S. economy, including small businesses and small communities.” The report signals the Obama administration’s understanding that regulatory “cap and trade” will have tremendous impact on the American economy.

The OMB’s review parallels Utah legislator Roger Barrus’ move earlier this year to amend his state’s energy policy “to determine the economic impacts of a proposed legislative or executive action involving climate change.” The Barrus bill was introduced because several districts in Utah include major coal mining interests concerned about potential impacts of the Western Climate Initiative and the development of alternative and renewable energy resources. When reached for comment, Barrus denied that his HB 412 would have provided a barrier to entry for green energy businesses in his state. “The bill was not primarily directed at the WCI,” said Barrus, “it was an effort to be certain that the state would not ‘rubber-stamp’ any regulation that would drastically change our energy security.”

Utah State Legislator Roger Barrus

The recent effort by President Obama’s Office of Management and Budget “certainly sends the message that, at this point in time, we have to pay close attention to the impacts of regulatory influence on the nation’s energy economy,” Barrus observed. He noted that in Utah, “…we have a significant portion of our economy that relies upon the development of coal and other fossil fuels for the nation’s energy needs.” He stated that before the introduction of his bill, the state may have been on a course to adopt specific regulations via the Western Climate Initiative that would have severely impacted some of the state’s energy businesses and local economies.

Barrus’ district 18 is north of Salt Lake City where a recent application for an emissions permit would have allowed a new power plant to burn refinery waste to generate electricity. That application received much opposition from the electorate and was recently withdrawn. Barrus’ House Bill 412 died a technical death in the waning days of the Utah legislative season, but proponents and other co-sponsors vowed to re-introduce it this fall, if required. With the recent acknowledgement of the Obama administration’s OMB, that may be less necessary now. “It’s important that each state have an opportunity to participate so that we have all the information to make correct decisions without regulatory disparities,” Barrus said.

The Hunt for the New Ground Zero

La Gloria, Chignahuapan, Mexico

From the first reports, the outbreak was termed "swine flu," until policymakers began to receive complaints from pork producers. Presently, the official name of the level 5 epidemic is the "H1N1 virus" while the rest of the story continues to unfold in several places around the globe. In Atlanta, at the headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control, researchers are tasked to determine the virulence of the disease. Staff there also respond to incoming questions from public officials, health caregivers and the public and their ranks include other U.S. government agencies responsible for worldwide public safety and the health of their own employees.

A newmedia reporter named César Chagoya uncovered a large and purportedly contaminated hog farm named Granjas Caroll near the village of La Gloria in southwest Mexico, where young Edgar Hernandez contracted the H1N1 strain.



video courtesy of the ASSOCIATED PRESS

While young Edgar Hernandez recovered, an additional 800 residents of La Gloria also contracted a mysterious flu just down the road from the object of Chagoya's investigation. Granjas Caroll is principally owned by U.S. based Smithfield Foods, one of America's largest supplier of pork products. The Granjas Caroll operation yields 950,000 hogs per year as reported on the company's website.

What Chagoya found upon visiting the mexican hog farm were deplorable conditions involving rampant filth and contamination resulting in hogs "unfit from excessive force feeding and drinking from a water source that contained their own blood and excrement." As the Associated Press video describes, the company countered a season of public complaint by claiming that since none of their hogs had been diagnosed with porcine flu, they couldn't be the source of any contamination or infection. Officials cite their technological advances as a reason why they couldn't be culpable for any public health concerns, including a "bio-digester" (where whole, rotting carcasses are disposed) that the company claims generates electricity for their plant. Raising pigs may be a dirty business by nature, but what Chagoya documented was contamination of the foulest kind, including photographs of the collecting ponds used for the massive herd's drinking water.

Backtracking the information, Chagoya discovered that Smithfield Foods had been the respondent in legal actions stemming from contaminated operations in Virginia. The people of La Gloria and others like Chagoya are asking questions about coincidence in disease and contamination and they say the two are linked. While it is true that people cannot be infected by eating pork or pork products, a mutating viral strain that genetically leaps from swine to people is of major concern to medical authorities, especially if it becomes a deadly mutation.

Health investigators are presently splitting their focus on both California and Mexico, saying that some children in California were identified with the N1H1 virus in March, several weeks before Edgar Hernandez fell ill in early April. But if a March increase in pneumonia (which can be caused by an influenza virus like H1N1) in and around La Gloria is found to be linked to the virus, Mexico's efforts to contain the outbreak, and the concern of La Gloria about their porcine neighbors, may prove to be even more important.

The CDC describes the real danger potential of the H1N1 virus as a future hybrid arriving after the first outbreak has been endured in the northern hemisphere. That scenario makes the murderous 1918 flu look like a foreshadowing of grave proportions, and the world awaits with baited breath.