The Old Economy
The Montana Supreme Court Thursday handed a victory to those seeking to protect Montana's waterways and dealt a setback to the proposed Rock Creek Mine near Noxon.
"Absolutely. This is a victory," said Clark Fork Coalition director Karen Knudsen, about the ruling that voided the Revett Minerals' permit to discharge up to 3.3 million gallons of polluted water per day into the Clark Fork River.
A collection of conservation groups had challenged the water quality permit, issued in 2001. The mine has been on the drawing board for more than 30 years. The ruling overturned a previous ruling from district court, which OK'd the Montana Department of Environmental Quality decision to deem the discharge "nonsignificant," thus allowing the mine to avoid a more rigorous "non-degradation analysis."
Uncertainty in Missoula Manufacturing
Rumors Swirl Around Frenchtown Mill
Falling demand for cardboard boxes has prompted fresh rumors to swirl around Frenchtown's Smurfit-Stone paperboard facility about a pending closure. Company officials say the plant will stay open.
"I hope it doesn't happen," said Roy Houseman, union representative for the workers there. "But if it does, it wouldn't surprise me."
If the plant did close, it would mean the loss of about 390 jobs. The plant, which supplies cardboard box-making plants with corrugated paperboard, recently laid off 52 employees. The international manufacturing giant says it will hire those workers back at the end of the year.
"That's very possible, too," Houseman said, who was among those recently laid off.
More The Old Economy
Real Estate or Industrial Site
What Will Become of Stimson’s Land?Scott Cooney, a Missoula developer, says he has a months-old agreement with Stimson Lumber Co. to buy the company's defunct mill site in Bonner and wants it honored.
"We just want to buy it," Cooney said, adding that the old offer of $10 million for the entire site is immaterial. He would pay up to $16 million, which is what Stimson officials said would take the property and all its industrial equipment and structures off the Portland-based manufacturer's hands.
It's hard to know exactly how serious he is: Cooney said today that if Stimson doesn't honor its earlier agreement with him, he might seek legal action.
The bigger question remains what will happen on that expanse of land at the confluence of the Clark Fork and Blackfoot rivers.
What-a-deal category
Buy the Stimson Property East of Missoula, and Get a Working Mill for Free
Stimson Lumber Co. officials in Missoula met with Craig Rawlings of TimberBuySell.Com, representatives of Montana's congressional delegation and others to spread the news about an offer: Buy the former Stimson plant in Bonner for $16 million and get all the equipment, including a working stud mill, for free.
The offer stands until Sept. 30.
paperboard blues
Workers Hope to Rescue Missoula’s Paper Mill
An enterprising young millworker and his union cohorts have a plan to save Missoula's Smurfit-Stone paperboard mill.
The millworker is 27-year-old Roy Houseman.
"It's a serious concern," Houseman said. "But I'm going to do my damnedest to make sure it doesn't happen."
New West Columnist: Know Your Miner
An Old Industry Roars in Butte
Falling prices may be taking the sheen off the real estate economy around the Rocky Mountain West, but some outposts of the once-left-for-dead resource economy are practically printing money. Foremost among them is the copper mine in Butte.
The copper mine in Butte? Isn't that a defunct Superfund site? Superfund, yes, but "defunct" is not quite the right word.
The Berkeley Pit and its smaller sibling, the Continental, employ only 348 miners and support staff. (Copper mining employed tens of thousands a century ago) But while the hard rock miners of old toiled in dangerous conditions, nowadays a Butte mining job is one to die for in a very different way.
Boulder Becomes 'Smart Grid City'
The Grid Gets a Brain
If all goes as planned Boulder will become the world’s first “fully integrated Smart Grid City,” says regional utility Xcel Energy. Envisioned as the first true innovation in electricity distribution in close to a century, the Smart Grid movement is essentially developing ways to bring digital Internet-based technology to power lines, giving utilities and business and residential customers greater control and efficiency in the flow of electricity.
Ultimately, once the Smart Grid takes over a significant chunk of the existing power distribution infrastructure, utilities and governments will be able to use the power of the Web to better manipulate how electricity is generated and delivered.
In other energy news: Democrats ready populist energy legislation; Colorado eyes fine print on electricity bills; and O&G executives foresee oil-price downturn by the end of the year.
Against the Laws
Oil Price Off the Rails The convergence of record high gas prices ($3.60 a gallon average across the U.S.), a presidential campaign, obscenely high earnings reports from Big Oil, and the prospect of $4 gas during the summer driving season has led to some rampant silliness, including the proposed “gas-tax holiday” being backed by candidates Hillary Clinton and John McCain. Congress plans to get into the act, pledging to bring forth legislation to offer low-income Americans relief from high prices at the pump – legislation that President Bush will almost certainly veto.
The price surge is also leading to an alarming question: has the oil industry jumped the rails of basic economic laws?
According to economics, soaring prices would, in normal times, lead to increased output of oil, reduced demand and a subsequent reduction (or at least a flattening) in prices. But prices haven’t followed suit.
In other energy news: Colorado Wildlife Commission weighs in on oil and gas production; Xcel plans to shutter coal plants opposed by consumer-protection agency; and Colorado will study the economic effects of new oil and gas regulations on the industry.
NewWest.Net Conferences
Designing the New West
The Designing the New West: Architecture and Landscape in the Mountain West Conference is wrapping up here in Bozeman at the historic Gallatin Gateway Inn. Put on by NewWest.Net and sponsored by the Sonoran Institute, the conference brought together designers from all over the country to explore innovative design ideas, identify best practices, and better understand how to bridge the gap between good architectural theory and sometimes-messy building practices in the fastest growing region in the nation.
A mix of presentations and engaging panel discussions tackled pressing Western issues like sustainable development, land design and the special challenges of urban, rural and resort design, historic preservation and affordable housing.
Click on the photo or here for a slideshow of the days' events. Click "more" for a recap of the conference.
