The Old Economy
Movement on Climate Change
Politics & Energy A Combustible Mix
There's encouraging news on the energy-politics front this week, as congressional leaders look set to agree on a long-delayed energy bill, world leaders prepare for a major climate-change conference in Bali, Indonesia, and the federal Energy Information Administration reported a 1.5% drop in total greenhouse-gas emissions in 2006 compared to the previous year.
Even Colorado Republicans got into the act, saying they are readying a slate of environmental bills that will include measures to support the logging of beetle-infested pine trees and encouraging consumers to buy energy-efficient appliances.
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Lumber Drops... Again
Montana’s Wood Products Industry Continues to DeclineWhatever happens with logging on Montana’s forests and why, one thing is clear: Montana’s traditional wood products industry continues its slow stumble toward oblivion.
The latest news? The slumping U.S. housing industry this year has dampened demand – and prices – for manufactured wood products such as 2-by-4s and other building materials, said Todd Morgan, the new director of forestry research at the University of Montana’s Bureau of Business and Economic Research. Morgan bases his analysis on visits to mills across the West as well as on surveys, discussions with mill owners, federal data and other sources.
With raw timber already priced high and hard to come by, Morgan said, Montana mills are getting squeezed. They’re cutting back on production, and several mills have closed in the past few years, including the big former Stimson Lumber plywood plant in Bonner near Missoula. Expect more closures if business conditions don't improve, he said.
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BEAVERHEAD-DEERLODGE PARTNERSHIP
Conservation Groups and Timber Companies Collaborate
Collaboration between three conservation groups and five major timber companies has produced a plan for the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest, Montana's largest, that would allow for both increased logging and expanded wilderness areas.
Tom France, director of the National Wildlife Federation's Northern Rockies region, and Bob Boschee, general manager for Missoula's Smurfit-Stone pulp and paper mill, spoke at a Friday meeting of City Club Missoula about their involvement in the drafting of the Beaverhead-Deerlodge Partnership bill.
"We have such a big common interest," Boschee said of conservationists and the timber industry. "The differences we have are not that significant." Sustainable forest health, Boschee said, is a primary objective for both groups.
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Coal Is Still King
Solar Future Suddenly CloudyCoal up, solar down – that's the message from the markets and the media this week, as solar-power companies face a possible expiration of the tax credits for solar investments, while coal producers and coal plants continue to boom despite the looming threat of carbon-emissions caps.
The Solar Energy Industries Association posted an alert on its Web site citing "widespread reports" that the long-awaited energy bill being laboriously squeezed through Congress will not include a measure to extend the Solar Investment Tax Credits.
Meanwhile The Economist reports that for all the news about states in the U.S. delaying or canceling the construction of new coal-fired plants, coal is still king (Sub. req.) in much of the world. "Utilities in both [the U.S. and Western Europe] are running their coal-fired plants at full throttle, have several new ones under construction and would like to build even more," the influential British newsweekly reports.
In other energy news: Western governors team for TV ads pushing energy policy legislation in Congress; "micro-hydro" makes a comeback in the Roaring Fork Valley; and the process of divvying up state oil and gas revenue in Colorado goes on, and on, and on...
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Monday Business Roundup
Defying Trends, Western Economy on the RiseWith the national equity markets slumping and Fed chief Ben Bernanke predicting an economic slowdown, the question becomes, how long can states in the Mountain West defy the national trends?
Booming energy production, strong tourism results, a resilient construction sector buoyed by the continuing influx of new arrivals, a resurgent technology industry – all of these are contributing to making the Mountain West the nation's strongest economic region. Now, some snow for the skiing industry would help.
In other business news: Colorado legislators seek a new method of distributing exploding revenues from energy production; Crocs' magical stock-market ride ends with a thud; and Colorado's State Fair faces a roller-coaster future.
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Hurdles For E-Trains
Light Rail Loses Its Green LusterBackers of Northern Colorado's ambitious FasTracks plans for light rail spidering out from downtown Denver cannot be pleased with the results of this week's referendum in Washington State.
There, voters soundly rejected a long-term, multi-billion-dollar mass transit plan for Seattle that had as its centerpiece the Puget Sound's first light-rail system. Notably, among the groups expressing doubts about the "Roads & Transit" Proposition 1 were environmentalists like the Sierra Group.
In other energy news: Gov. Ritter unveils his Climate Plan while seeking middle ground with the oil and gas industry, and energy prices hit an unfortunate trifecta with gasoline, heating oil, and diesel fuel all topping $3 a gallon.
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Monday Business Roundup
Facing Life in Prison, Boulder Banker Chooses DeathWhen it came down to face-the-music time, former Boulder banker Edward Mattar III took the traditional desperate-financier's way out: a long walk off a short ledge. Newspapers around the country reviewed Mattar's life and times after he plunged 27 stories to his death in downtown Denver just hours before he was to be sentenced for his role in the failure of BestBank. And it was not a pretty story.
At 67, Mattar faced spending the rest of his life in prison after being convicted in February of conspiracy, bank fraud, filing false bank reports and wire fraud. His personal fortune was decimated: he faced fines of $14 million.
In other business news: Anschutz Entertainment Group plans a New Orleans-style music fest for Denver; Newmont Mining's fortunes turn; and Xcel Energy makes plans to shut down some power plants.
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Dethroning King Coal
‘Clean’ Coal Faces Grimy Future"Clean" coal suffered another significant setback this week as Xcel Energy said it would put off a decision on a proposal for a billion-dollar-plus coal-gasification plant. "At least 10 proposals for coal-gasification plants in the U.S. have been delayed or canceled this year," according to Steve Raabe of The Denver Post.
Xcel's delay in considering trying to build a clean-coal plant is particularly significant because the proposal included a carbon-sequestration system to inject and store CO2 underground.
Montana Gov. Schweitzer's ambitious plans to create a coal-to-liquid-fuel industry in the state have also largely been derailed.
In other energy news: investors gather to plot geothermal production on the Western Slope; Congress hears about health risks from rampant natural gas drilling in the West; and Aspen Skico plans a large solar array for Carbondale.
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Energy, Environment
House Passes Mining Reform, White House Threatens VetoThe House voted 244-166 to reform a 135-year-old mining law Thursday afternoon, and force the hardrock mining industry to pay royalties on minerals extracted from public lands – just like the coal, oil and gas industries.
The Hardrock Mining and Reclamation Act (HR 2262) requires miners on federal lands to pay royalties of 8 percent of gross income on new mining operations, four percent on existing operations.
Republicans like Rep. Bill Sali of Idaho, predicted that the bill will destroy the American mining industry, exporting jobs and the industry to overseas countries that have little or no environmental regulations and have child labor in the mines. The White House has threatened a veto, saying that placement of royalties on existing mining operations invites lawsuits.
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Timber giant takes a hit
Plum Creek’s Risky Businesses
As the Plum Creek Timber Company becomes increasingly prominent in the real estate game, the nation’s biggest private landowner is learning to deal with the ebbs and flows of those two unpopular headline grabbers of late: the weak housing market and its associated credit worries.
Less than a week after the timber giant reported that third quarter profits were down 36 percent from last year, the company’s director of land asset management in Montana, Jerry Sorensen, spoke to a room of about 300 – including prominent developers, Realtors, planners and economists from around the Northwest – about Plum Creek’s transition into the real estate market at the second annual NewWest.Net Real Estate and Development of the Northern Rockies Conference. Sorensen opened up his presentation with a Bob Dylan quote: “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.”
“The timber industry,” Sorensen said, “is certainly in transition – everybody knows that.”
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