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Special Master Authorizes Additional Procedures For Payment Of Cobell v. Salazar Settlement Funds To Class Members’ Heirs
SEATTLE, July 24, 2013 /PRNewswire/ — The following statement is being issued by The Garden City Group, Inc. (GCG) regarding the Cobell v. Salazar Settlement.
Changes have been approved in the way payments can be distributed for deceased Class Members in the Cobell v. Salazar Settlement. The changes now allow the use of added procedures for payment to the heirs of deceased Class Members. In December 2012, the Court appointed the Honorable Richard A. Levie (Ret.) as Special Master. In orders issued on July 16, 2013, the Special Master authorized GCG to use additional payment procedures. GCG will now be allowed to use federal probate orders, and in some states, small estate procedures to distribute to the heirs of deceased Class Members. This is authorized when no state or tribal probate order, no probated will, and no legally-appointed executor or administrator exists.
Since December 2012, and in accordance with Orders of the District Court, GCG has worked hard to distribute settlement funds to the estates or heirs of deceased Class Members based on state and tribal probate orders. However, these probate orders do not exist in many cases and it can be costly and time consuming to start state or tribal probate proceedings. Given these difficulties, Counsel for the Cobell Class filed motions to allow GCG to use additional procedures to help with the distribution of settlement funds.
In certain states, GCG is now allowed to distribute funds to the heirs of deceased Class Members based on state small estate procedures. The states are: Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin.
In some cases, the Special Master’s orders allow GCG to use federal or Bureau of Indian Affairs probate orders as a guide for finding and getting funds to heirs of Class Members. Because using a federal probate order may lead to different results than state or tribal probate law, federal probate orders can only be used when no other approved documents have been given to GCG.
Copies of the Special Master’s orders can be found at www.IndianTrust.com. Individuals are strongly encouraged to contact GCG at 1-800-961-6109; or by email at info@indiantrust.com. They are encouraged to provide copies of state, tribal or federal probate orders for deceased Class Members. This will help GCG make distributions. Copies of these documents can be mailed to GCG at: Indian Trust Settlement, P.O. Box 9577, Dublin, Ohio 43017-4877.
Cobell v. Salazar is a class action filed in 1996 against the government for mismanaging their individual trust lands and the money from those lands. The action was led by the late Elouise Cobell and the class is currently represented by David Smith and Bill Dorris of the law firm of Kilpatrick, Townsend & Stockton LLP. After years of intense litigation, a $3.4 billion settlement was reached in 2009. It was approved by Congress in 2010 and held to be fair by Judge Hogan in 2011. All of the appeals were dismissed or withdrawn by late November 2012. The government has since funded the Settlement.
More information on the Settlement can be found at the website: www.IndianTrust.com.
By John M. Glionna, Los Angeles Times
SAN FRANCISCO — Federal wildlife officials have moved one step closer to their plan to play referee in a habitat supremacy contest that has pitted two species of owl against one another in the forests of the Pacific Northwest.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released a final environmental review of an experiment planned in three states to see if killing barred owls will assist the northern spotted owls, which are threatened with extinction after a major loss of territory since the 1970s.
The agency’s preferred course of action calls for killing 3,603 barred owls in four study areas in Oregon, Washington and Northern California over the next four years. At a cost of $3 million, the plan requires a special permit under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, which prohibits killing non-game birds.
“It’s a fair assessment to say that going after the barred owls is the plan we’d prefer to pursue,” Robin Bown, a federal wildlife biologist, told the Los Angeles Times.
The agency began evaluating alternatives in 2009, gathering public comment and consulting ethicists, focus groups and conduction scientific studies.
It will issue a final decision on the plan in 30 days.
Animal activists have blasted the federal plan, saying the government should stay out of the fray and let the more dominant bird prevail, as nature intended.
The northern spotted owl is at the center of an ongoing battle between woodcutters and environmentalists across the Pacific Northwest. Because of its dwindling numbers, the little bird is listed as a threatened species by the federal government and in Washington, Oregon and California, Bown said.
On Tuesday, the timber industry criticized the barred owl harvest.
“Shooting a few isolated areas of barred owl isn’t going to help us as forest managers, nor is it going to help the forest be protected from wildfires, and catastrophic wildfire is one of the big impediments to spotted owl recovery,” Tom Partin, president of the American Forest Resource Council, a timber industry group, told the Associated Press.
Bown disagreed.
“To people who say to me that we should leave those owls alone, my response is that ‘So you’re accepting the extinction of the spotted owl? That’s OK?’”
Bown told The Times there have been several mischaracterizations of the federal plan.
“We’re not sending public hunters into the woods to declare open season on the barred owl. This is a controlled experiment, using folks who are trained and skilled at animal removal. Our goal in this experiment is twofold: Will moving barred owls help the spotted owl population to recover? And can we use removal of barred owls as a management tool?”
Unless barred owls are brought under control, the spotted owl in coming decades might disappear from Washington’s northern Cascade Range and Oregon’s Coast Range, where the barred owl incursion has been greatest, Bown said.
“In our projected study areas, the removal would represent a very small percentage of the barred owls,” she said. “We’re also taking steps to mitigate habitat threats to the spotted owls, such as large-scale fires and timber harvests.”
Barred owls are bigger and more aggressive than the northern spotted variety. Native to the East Coast, they began working their way across the Great Plains in the early 1900s, driven west by human development. By the 1970s, the species had spread to the West Coast, where their numbers have multiplied.
In some areas of their range, northern spotted owls are outnumbered 5-to-1 by barred owls.
“While some people just feel we should leave things alone, we want to take a small step at a resolution with this experiment,” Bown told The Times.
“After all, humans had a hand in getting the barred owl here in the northwest.”
Source: Marysville Globe
MARYSVILLE — The city of Marysville is seeking sponsors, and accepting submissions from vendors and performers, to participate in the first in what they hope will become an annual series of multicultural fairs, celebrating cultural diversity this fall through ethnic foods, music, dance and art.
This free event is set to run from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 28, in Comeford Park, located at 514 Delta Ave. in Marysville. Attendees are invited to enjoy music and dance from around the world on the performance stage in the Rotary Pavilion, all while experiencing traditions from other lands through demonstrations and displays, as well as partaking of a food court where exotic ethnic foods will be available for purchase.
Cultural artwork will also be on display, representing submissions from an all-ages diversity arts contest coordinated by the Marysville Arts Commission and the Mayor’s Diversity Advisory Committee. The deadline for entries has been extended to Thursday, Aug. 27. Log onto http://marysvillewa.gov/diversityarts for further details. The event will also feature a number of cultural resource and craft vendors, with hands-on activities for children.
“Sponsorship features many benefits for your organization or business, and an opportunity to share your commitment to a more diverse, inclusive and welcoming workplace and community,” said Marysville Mayor Jon Nehring, who established the Diversity Advisory Committee in 2010 to advise him and fellow government leaders on issues of diversity and inclusion. “We hope you will become a festival sponsor, supporting diversity and cultural understanding in Marysville, and we look forward to sharing the music, sights and sounds of diversity with you and the community.”
A number of sponsorship opportunities are available, with participation levels ranging from $1,000 and above, to as low as $100.
Through this multicultural fair, the Mayor’s Diversity Advisory Committee is making good on one of the recommended actions in its two-year Diversity Work Plan, by establishing an event that celebrates cultural, physical and mental differences among people, and sends a message that those differences are valued year-round.
Vendor and performance forms are available on the city of Marysville’s website at http://marysvillewa.gov/multiculturalfair. The event is seeking booth vendors, whether you are a craft or food vendor, a social services agency or organization that works to promote diversity internally or generally in your interaction with the public, or an individual or group performer that represents a particular culture with singing, music, dance or all of the above. To learn more, contact Diversity Committee Staff Liaison Doug Buell by phone at 360-363-8086 or via email at dbuell@marysvillewa.gov.
Source: Marysville Globe
EVERETT — Domestic Violence Services of Snohomish County is seeking new or very gently used twin blankets and towels for victims of domestic abuse and their children.
Items may be dropped off at the New and Again Thrift Shoppe, located at 3116 Rucker Ave. in Everett.
For other drop-off locations or more information, contact Stephanie Civey, special events and marketing coordinator for Domestic Violence Services of Snohomish County, by phone at 425-259-2827, ext. 13, or via email at stephanie@dvs-snoco.org.
David Roberts, Grist
In my last post, I referenced a new report from Goldman Sachs analysts showing that the market for seaborne thermal coal (overseas imports and exports used to fuel power plants) is likely to fall from 7 percent annual growth to around 1 percent, and stay there for the foreseeable future. This is great news, in that it has the potential to render several new large-scale coal-extraction projects around the world — including export terminals in the U.S. Pacific Northwest — unprofitable before they are completed or, in some cases, begun.
However, this bit of good news should not distract from the larger picture, which is decidedly grim. As oil prices remain stubbornly high, the rapidly urbanizing developing world has turned to coal, which has been growing at a furious pace and is on the verge of becoming the world’s primary energy source. Even if its momentum is slowing slightly, it remains a world-crushing behemoth.
No one has been following this story more closely than energy analyst Gregor Macdonald. This is from his blog:
Yikes! As Macdonald writes, “Only a very small portion of the global public is aware that global coal consumption has advanced by over 50% in the past decade.”
By 2011, coal represented 30.34 percent of total global energy use, according to the BP Statistical Review, just a few points shy of Old King Oil:
What’s more, while coal’s hyper-growth may be slowing slightly, many of the long-term drivers behind it remain firmly in place. In particular, as developing-world urbanization pushes more global energy demand into cities, the balance of power (as it were) shifts to electrical grids, precisely where coal is strongest.
In China, coal expansion is slowing in part due to small, inefficient plants being closed, but as Michael Davidson explains (in a great series on energy in China), shifting to bigger, more efficient, longer-lived plants may lock in a coal “floor” in China for many decades to come.
It’s worth noting that the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) is somewhat more bullish on coal than Goldman Sachs. According to its 2013 International Energy Outlook, in the absence of strong climate policies, coal will grow … well, a whole sh*t ton. Climate Progress reports:
If business as usual continues for the world’s climate policy, the EIA’s mid-range projections show consumption of coal — the dirtiest fossil fuel in terms of carbon emissions — increasing by over a third by 2040. It nearly doubles by that time under the worst case scenarios. Specifically, the EIA’s “Reference Case” projects global coal consumption jumping from 147.4 quadrillion Btu of energy in 2010 to 219.5 in 2040. … But looking across the range of scenarios the EIA lays out, coal consumption could only reach 182.2 quadrillion Btu by 2040 — or go as high as 297.3 quadrillion Btu.
Even the low end of that range is scary as hell. When we talk about a decline in global coal’s growth rate, it’s crucial to remember that even a small percentage of a gargantuan amount is … a lot. When I ran the Goldman Sachs report by him over email, Macdonald pointed out that the analysts forecast growth in global coal demand from 5,564 million tons per anum in 2013 to 6,564 mtpa in 2017. That’s relatively slow growth, percentage wise, but in absolute terms it is 1,000,000,000 more tons of coal a year being burnt. “This is some serious BTU growth,” Macdonald says.
The global coal juggernaut is so large now that even a low rate of growth represents an enormous amount of new greenhouse gas emissions. Not only that, it represents an enormous amount of new momentum. If there is to be any hope in the long term, the trajectory of coal urgently needs to change. Concludes Macdonald:
A tonne of coal stopped right now by other means, other sources, and preferably renewables, is equal to many, many tonnes stopped in the future. Stop that tonne of coal today and you kill path dependence, beat sunk-cost decision making, and divert the Big River of global energy ten years from now. It’s critical to think in these dynamic terms, as the very large system lumbers forward, with its constellation of politicians, corporations, and myriad other dependencies attaching themselves to whatever system comes into being. Renewables create their own constituency, just like coal. Coal is not special. Change the river now, and you amplify what happens a decade from here.
If we can’t divert that river, if we can’t find some way of urbanizing the developing world with low-carbon power, we are well and truly screwed. Coal must be attacked head on, much more furiously than anyone has yet contemplated, if there is to be any hope of climate stability.
Claire Thompson, Grist
Tuesday, in her first speech as EPA administrator, Gina McCarthy got real with a crowd at Harvard Law School, the AP reports:
“Can we stop talking about environmental regulations killing jobs? Please, at least for today,” said McCarthy, referring to one of the favorite talking points of Republicans and industry groups.
“Let’s talk about this as an opportunity of a lifetime, because there are too many lifetimes at stake,” she said of efforts to address global warming.
The GOP has resorted to calling pretty much every Obama plan, especially those related to the climate, “job-killing.” McCarthy hammered home the emptiness of that claim. The Hill relays what she said:
The truth is cutting carbon pollution will spark business innovation, resulting in cleaner forms of American-made energy …
Right now, state and local communities — as well as industry, universities, and other non-profits — have been piloting projects, advancing policies, and developing best practices that follow the same basic blueprint: combining environmental and economic interests for combined maximum benefit. These on-the-ground efforts are the future. It’s a chance to harness the American entrepreneur spirit, developing new technologies and creating new jobs, while at the same time reducing carbon pollution to help our children and their children.
By appointing McCarthy, who pushed through tougher air-pollution regulations while at the head of EPA’s office of air quality, Obama signaled that he’s serious about using his executive power to cut carbon emissions. She warned him that she wouldn’t have an easy time getting Senate confirmation, The New York Times reports:
“Why would you want me?” Ms. McCarthy said she asked the president when he offered her the top job. “Do you realize the rules I’ve done over the past three or four years?” …
The president told Ms. McCarthy that his environmental and presidential legacy would be incomplete without a serious effort to address climate change.
She was right: Winning confirmation was an arduous process. But now that she’s in, she is “pumped” about the new job. More from the Times:
[S]he said the agency would play a crucial role in dealing with climate change, both in writing the rules to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from new and existing power plants and in helping communities adapt to the inevitable changes wrought by a warming planet.
She also said the agency had to do a better job of explaining its mission to hostile constituencies, including Congress and the agriculture, mining and utility industries. …
“I spend a lot of time protecting what we are doing rather than thinking about what we should be doing.”
McCarthy’s trip to Cambridge for her Harvard speech is the first of many public appearances she’ll be making over the coming weeks, part of a big push by the Obama administration and other Democrats to promote Obama’s climate plan. Politico reports:
Starting [this] week, McCarthy will begin traveling around the country to discuss the importance of acting on climate change. The White House official said her schedule includes speeches, media events and meetings with outside groups — all of which will be promoted heavily on social media. And the official added that McCarthy will begin meeting with states soon to discuss the agency’s pending climate regulations.
It’s nice to see Democrats going on the offensive for climate. If you happen to belong to the 80 percent of voters under 35 who support the president’s climate plan, you can launch your own promotion effort, too — maybe start by convincing your cranky uncle that emissions regulations don’t kill jobs.
Gale Courey Toensing, Indian Country Today Media Network
Connecticut officials have jumped on Sen. Richard Blumenthal’s bandwagon of opposition to the Interior Department’s proposed revisions to the federal recognition regulations.
RELATED: Blumenthal Stirs Opposition Federal Recognition Again
On June 21, Kevin Washburn, Interior’s Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, unveiled a red lined “Preliminary Discussion Draft” of potential changes to Interior’s process for federally acknowledging Indian tribes.
RELATED: Washburn’s Bold Plan to Fix Interiors Federal Recognition Process
Two weeks later Blumenthal organized a meeting in his Connecticut office to rouse local and state officials into fighting the proposed revisions in order to prevent the possible federal acknowledgment of the Schaghticoke Tribal Nation (STN), the Eastern Pequot Tribal Nation (EPTN), and the Golden Hill Paugusetts. Now those state officials are reaching out to both the federal government and local officials in their efforts to delay and ultimately quash any possibility that those three state-recognized tribes could become federally acknowledged.
On July 22, John Rodolico, Nicholas Mullane and Robert Congdon, respectively, the mayor and first selectmen of the towns of Ledyard, North Stonington and Preston in southeastern Connecticut where the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and Mohegan Tribe own and operate Foxwoods Resort Casino and Mohegan Sun, wrote to Interior Secretary Sally Jewell complaining about what they claim would be “dramatic consequences for our towns and the state of Connecticut” if the proposed changes were enacted. “Despite the clear effect of the proposal on previously denied and potential future tribal acknowledgment decisions in Connecticut, no meeting has been scheduled anywhere close to our state and a short comment period of only 60 days has been offered,” the elected officials wrote. They did not describe the “dramatic consequences” or the “clear effect” of the proposed revisions on the state, but they asked Jewell to extend the August 16 comment period by 45 days.
Even though Washburn had already announced that Interior would hold both tribal consultations and public comment sessions, the town officials pushed for public comments. “We understand that the announced basis for the release of the preliminary draft is to consult with tribal interests under federal Indian policy. Comments from non-tribal interests are also essential, however. BIA can obtain a full record and be properly advised on the proposal only if it provides sufficient time to review this highly detailed proposal.”
The town officials were an integral part of Blumenthal’s previous organized – and successful – anti-Indian acknowledgment efforts. The former Connecticut attorney general orchestrated a campaign of political opposition that included local, state and federal elected officials and an anti-Indian sovereignty group with a powerful White House-connected lobbyist – Barbour Griffith & Rogers (BGR) – in 2004-2005. After 18 months of relentless lobbying, the BIA in an unprecedented move reversed its Final Determinations and issued Reconsidered Final Determinations (RFD) overturning both the STN and EPTN’s federal acknowledgment. James Cason, Interior’s Associate Deputy Secretary at the time and a non-Indian Bush appointee, issued the RFD.
RELATED: Judge Denies Schaghticoke Federal Recognition Appeal
Ironically, the town officials told Jewell there’s no need to change the regulations. “The current rules have been in effect for over 30 years, and we are aware of no reason to rush through a sweeping revision process such as been proposed in the preliminary discussion draft,” they wrote. These same town officials, however, joined in the chorus of Connecticut official voices that complained that the federal recognition process was “broken” and “tainted by political influence” (even though the Inspector General investigated and found no wrong doing on the part of the tribes or BIA staff) when the EPTN and STN received positive Final Determinations but lauded the regulations and process once the tribes’ acknowledgments were overturned.
RELATED: Blumenthal Blasts BIAs New Rules
RELATED: Schaghticoke and Eastern Pequot Decisions Reversed
Schaghticoke Tribal Nation Chief Richard Velky could not be reached for comment, nor could a spokesperson for the Eastern Pequot Tribal Nation. But an STN member close to the chief who asked not to be named said that Blumenthal and the town officials he leads are “up to their same old tricks. They want the extension only so that they can muster up anti-Indian support across the United States to oppose the tribes in Connecticut like they did in 2004 and 2005. They’ve been prepared to oppose the Schaghticokes for the last 200 years. They really don’t need the extra time – all their opposition is already on file with the federal government.”
According to e-mails reviewed by Indian Country Today Media Network, the e-mail to Jewell was written by Don Baur of the firm Perkins Coie, which represented the towns in previously opposing STN and EPTN. The North Stonington selectman sent the letter to several town officials seeking their signatures or suggesting they write their own letters of opposition to the proposed revisions to the Interior secretary.
Read more at http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2013/07/31/connecticut-town-officials-dance-blumenthals-anti-indian-tune-150656
By Angelo Bruscas, North Coast News
The first landing locally for the Paddle to Quinault 2013 was blessed with calm seas and a light overcast at low tide on Damon Point when five tribal canoes from Southwest Washington and Oregon pulled in for the last leg of their journey to the shores of the Quinault Indian Nation.
Even though Monday’s landing was in Ocean Shores, it technically is on Quinault land, too, with the Ocean Shores RV Park and Marina owned by the host tribe. The site will harbor campers and canoe teams connected to the intertribal journey of nearly 100 canoes that will end this weekend at Point Grenville, south of Taholah. The city of Ocean Shores issued a permit to the RV Park to allow spill-over camping on the other side of Marine View Drive, and many of the teams arrived with large groups of followers and supporters on Monday afternoon.
They were greeted by a Quinault contingent that included Tribal Council members, drummers, pageant royalty and dancers in traditional clothing, along with customary greetings and requests from the canoe teams for permission to come ashore.
“Thank you for sharing what you have, what you have been given by the Great Spirit,” Quinault Tribal Council member Richard Underwood called out in greeting the arriving teams. “We look forward to hearing your songs and your dances and joining in the festivities. On behalf of our royalty here, our Miss Quinault and Miss Teen Quinault, we welcome you to come ashore and share with us your history. We are thankful you made it here safe. Welcome. Come ashore!”
Jeremiah Wallace, 32, skipper of the Cowlitz Tribe canoe, was thankful the team would have a chance to rest up before making the final 30-mile pull to the beach at Point Grenville. The Cowlitz team and canoes from Grand Ronde and Warm Springs had traveled down the Columbia River and up the coast, meeting the Chinook Tribe’s canoes at the mouth of the Columbia, and actually arriving a day earlier than expected.
“We’re pretty happy to be here,” said a hoarse and exhausted Wallace, who now lives in Bellingham. The Cowlitz started at the Bonneville Dam on the Columbia and then met the Warm Springs, Grand Ronde and Chinook tribal canoes on the journey down the river into the open ocean, a place where Wallace had never been in the canoe. They also stopped at the Shoalwater Bay Tribe before crossing Grays Harbor on Monday.
The canoes averaged about 22-24 miles a day, and Wallace was sore on his side and his chest from the steering demands on his body. The biggest difficulty other than the normal hardship of pulling a paddle for a couple hundred miles was the fog, and Wallace said the canoes had to follow the lights of a Chinook crab boat and Grand Ronde Zodiac on Monday through the fog.
“This is my first time in the ocean. It was pretty calm out there, but it’s hard when you don’t have any relief pullers. You just have to keep pulling the whole time,” Wallace said.
CULTURAL CELEBRATION
The Paddle to Quinault is not just a canoe journey. It is a cultural celebration with song and dance, a Potlach, a demonstration of the wealth and riches of the community.
“People come from far and near to partake in these festivities that we will be having,” Underwood said as he described the event July 18 for over 400 people gathered at the Ocean Shores Convention Center.
As many as 15,000 people are expected to arrive this weekend as tribes throughout the Northwest journey by canoes up and down the coast, landing at Point Grenville, south of Taholah. There, they will be greeted with a feast and several days of hospitality by the Quinault Nation, which has been spending the past several months making gifts and stocking up on traditional foods, fish and game to feed and present to the incoming crowds.
“We want to show off our wealth, so to speak,” Underwood said at the Canoe Journey 2013 Community Dinner. “And by doing so, we make gifts … and we give those to our friends and relatives and our visitors who have traveled here.”
For those who venture out on the ocean or tribal members who make their way of life on the water, being part of the canoe journey can be a life-changing experience.
“Knowing not only you but 10 other people in that canoe have to work together in order for that canoe to stay true,” Underwood said. “That’s a life lesson.”
The Quinaults helped train other tribes in two sessions in May and June, and their journey can be tracked in real time online at: www.tinyurl.com/K77zryw
As a younger man, Underwood was often told that being on the ocean was part of his heritage. Being part of a canoe team teaches not only how to be self-reliant, but also how to depend on others. It’s a philosophy and way of life that applies to so many other facets of day-to-day living.
“That was something that my grandmother was trying to teach me, and I didn’t get it until the day it was revealed to me that I needed to get into that canoe and learn these ways,” he said.
CANOE JOURNEY
Called “pullers” rather than paddlers or rowers, the canoes are traveling together because of the rugged conditions posed by an ocean-going journey. In 2002, with fog and heavy surf, the Canoe Journey also came to Taholah, only it finished by entering the Quinault River, which proved treacherous for the 45 canoes that arrived. Grenville should be a much more calm landing.
The northern group includes several tribes making the journey down from British Columbia.
Ocean-going canoes from several Naut’sa mawt Tribal Council nations are traveling from Bella Coola, along the west coast of Vancouver Island and through the Salish Sea. Pullers from Sliammon, Snuneymuxw and Malahat will join the Journey as it heads south, meeting their relations from Puget Sound in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. The T’Sou-ke First Nation canoe crossed the strait, landing near Port Angeles for the last legs of the voyage, west to Makah and the open Pacific Ocean.
The B.C. connection goes back to 1989 when Quinault elder Emmett Oliver (now 100 years old) and Frank Brown of Bella Bella, B.C. first came up with the idea for the Paddle to Seattle. Nine traditional ocean-going cedar dugout canoes made the journey back then from coastal villages of Northwest Washington and B.C. to help celebrate the Washington Centennial. An added bonus to this year’s Journey will be the tall ships Lady Washington and Hawaiian Chieftain. The ships were invited by the Quinault to escort canoes along the open coast from Neah Bay.
The theme is “Honoring our Warriors,” and the veterans who have served others.
PADDLE SCHEDULE
Aug. 1: Canoes will leave Queets at about 7 a.m. They’ll arrive at Point Grenville at between 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. Dinner will be served between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m.
Aug. 3: The totem pole will be put up at 12 p.m.
Aug. 4: Race canoe presentations will be given at high tide.
By Laura Poppick, Staff Writer
LiveScience.com July 30, 2013
Renewable energy production hit an all-time high in the United States in 2012, according to a recent annual energy report.
A combination of government incentives and technological innovations has helped solar and wind power grow in the United States in recent years, the report suggests. From 2011 to 2012, production increased by 49 percent and wind energy increased by 16 percent, according to a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory annual energy analysis published earlier this month.
“I attribute the steady growth to technological advancements as well as tax incentives and state mandates for renewable energy,” said A.J. Simon, an energy analyst at LLNL, who wrote the report. “I would expect this to continue for a while.”
Though the trend is notable, wind and solar energy combined still accounted for only about 2 percent of total U.S. electricity consumption in 2012. Denmark and Spain, in comparison, produced an average of about 30 percent of their energy from wind power last year. [Power of the Future: 10 Ways to Run the 21st Century]
Oil and natural gas accounted for the majority of energy consumption in the United States, and will likely continue to dominate given recent investments in hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” Simon said. Fracking is the forceful injection of water, sand and chemicals deep into shale rock that releases previously trapped oil and gas deposits.
By opening up reservoirs of cheap and accessible fossil fuels, fracking could slow efforts to expand renewable energy, though this remains uncertain, according to Simon.
‘Potential game-changer’
Still, those involved in solar and wind energy production in the United States remain confident that these alternative options will continue to grow despite advancements in fracking.
“The turbines are capturing more energy and [the wind industry] is managing to keep costs low,” said Jason Cotrell, the manager of wind turbine technology and innovation with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
Recent efforts to improve wind power have focused on making the turbines taller so that they reach stronger air currents higher above the ground. This would allow wind farms to expand to areas that have previously been unsuitable for turbines due to low ground-level wind speeds.
“That would be the potential game-changer, when every state in the U.S. could benefit from wind,” Cotrell said.
Solar oversupply
Solar power has also benefitted from new innovations, but its recent success stems largely from a global oversupply of photovoltaic cells. The combined effects of the economic downturn in 2008 and overambitious renewable policies around the world resulted in an abundance of panels and a relatively small market, according to Tom Kimbis, vice president of Solar Energy Industries Association.
At this point, Kimbis said, expanding the reach of solar energy depends more on the price of the panels than improving their efficiency.
“The efficiency of the panels is now good,” Kimbis said. “The industry has been working to improve efficiency of solar cells for decades and it’s easy to buy a solar module with a 20 percent or higher efficiency today. That’s not really the issue right now. The issue that people care about is how much will it cost and will it work for them.”
Costs depend largely on government tax incentives, which vary from state to state and from year to year. Cotrell and Kimbis both believe that current work in innovating solar and wind power will continue to reduce baseline prices and increase the prevalence of renewable energy in the United States.
Follow Laura Poppick on Twitter. Follow LiveScience on Twitter,Facebook and Google+. Original article on LiveScience.
