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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2016
Cost of renewable mandate *HQHWLFDOO\HQJLQHHUHG¿VK
to ratepayers still unvetted labeling clears state House
By HILLARY BORRUD
Capital Bureau
SALEM — Oregon law-
makers are on track to pass
a bill that would double the
state’s renewable energy man-
date before state utility regula-
tors ¿nish vetting the potential
cost to consumers.
Lawmakers and Gov. Kate
Brown instead relied so far on
cost estimates by the utilities
that helped to write the bill,
which projected the legisla-
tion would increase ratepayers’
bills by an average of roughly
1 percent annually.
The situation adds to ques-
tions about who is looking out
for electricity consumers as the
Legislature moves to pass the
bill quickly during the short
35-day session.
The governor did not
respond on Wednesday morn-
ing to questions about whether
the cost of the bill mattered,
and if she would sign the bill
without cost vetting by state
regulators.
“The Governor’s Of¿ce has
encouraged the (Public Util-
ity Commission) to evaluate
the bill and actively engage in
the public process, which the
(Public Utility Commission)
pursued by providing testi-
mony, crafting amendments,
and holding its own public
hearing,” Brown’s press sec-
retary Chris Pair wrote in an
email Wednesday morning.
“We generally do not com-
ment publicly on the gov-
ernor’s position on a bill in
advance of its passing both
houses or her legal coun-
sel’s review for legal suf¿-
ciency and constitutionality
that every bill receives. That
said, the governor is commit-
ted to policies that increase
the availability of renewable
energy and address issues
around Oregonians’ invest-
ment in electricity produced
by coal and believes HB 4036
may be one way to make a
meaningful impact.”
Utilities helped
craft bill
Michael Dougherty, chief
operating of¿cer of the Public
Utility Commission of Oregon,
said earlier this week the Pub-
lic Utility Commission had not
received enough information
from Paci¿Corp and Portland
General Electric, the two inves-
tor owned utilities that helped
craft the bill, to vet the utili-
ties’ cost projections. Dougherty
wrote in an email that Portland
General Electric had provided
only “piecemeal” information
and Paci¿Corp had not pro-
vided any of the information
the Public Utility Commission
requested.
“Unfortunately, we have not
received (what we consider)
adequate data from the utilities
to substantiate or refute the pro-
jections (annual 1 percent to 1.5
percent increase in rates) pro-
vided to the committee by the
utilities,” Dougherty wrote in
an email Tuesday morning. By
Wednesday morning, Dough-
erty said the commission had
received more information from
Portland General Electric but he
had not yet ascertained what it
was or how useful it might be.
Ry Schwark, a spokesman
for Paci¿Corp, disagreed and
said much of the information
the Public Utility Commission
requested was available in pub-
lic reports. “My understanding
is we’ve given them everything
they’ve asked for,” Schwark
said.
Steve Corson, a spokesman
for Portland General Electric,
said the utility’s ¿rst priority was
to prepare for a presentation to
the Public Utility Commission
on the bill in late January. “And
then turned to the data request,”
Corson said. “The other thing I
would observe just in general
is data requests are not simple
things.”
Concerns about
cost to consumers
Public utility commission-
ers raised concerns privately
and at the meeting in late Jan-
uary, in particular that the bill
would be expensive for con-
sumers but do little to reduce
carbon emissions.
The state House already
voted 39-20 on Monday to
pass House Bill 4036.
Brown has said publicly that
she is still considering whether
to support the bill, but emails
released by the state showed her
administration worked behind
the scenes to help the bill pass
in the Legislature, The Orego-
nian reported on Wednesday.
House Bill 4036 would
require Paci¿Corp and Port-
land General Electric to use
renewable power sources such
as wind and solar to serve at
least 50 percent of their cus-
tomers’ energy demand in
Oregon by 2040. The current
state mandate is for 25 percent
renewable energy by 2025.
The bill would also require
the investor-owned utilities to
stop using coal to serve Ore-
gon customers, but there are
questions about how much
the bill would actually do to
impact the phase-out of coal
power in Oregon.
State Sen. Lee Beyer,
D-Spring¿eld,
originally
requested the Public Utility
Commission review House Bill
4036. Beyer did not respond
to a question this week about
whether he expects the com-
mission to ¿nish vetting the leg-
islation before it receives a vote
in the Senate. It also remains to
be seen whether the Senate will
ask the Public Utility Commis-
sion to provide its perspective
on the bill, something lawmak-
ers in the House did not do.
“At the House Energy and
Environment Committee, we
were not requested to provide
testimony,” Dougherty wrote
in an email. A representa-
tive was on hand, however, to
answer questions.
The Capital Bureau is a
collaboration between EO
Media Group and Pamplin
Media Group.
Bill originally
allowed local
control over
GMO crops
By MATEUSZ
PERKOWSKI
Capital Bureau
SALEM — The state
House Wednesday passed a
measure requiring the label-
ing of genetically engineered
¿sh.
Supporters of the labeling
requirement said it would
allow consumers to choose
conventional ¿sh if they had
doubts about the health or
environmental safety of bio-
tech salmon, which the fed-
eral government approved
last year.
The bill passed with a
narrow 32-27 vote.
“We deserve as con-
sumers to have the choice
where we put our money,”
said state Rep. Ken Helm,
D-Beaverton.
Genetically engineered
salmon will likely be cheaper
than wild-caught ¿sh from
Oregon, so labeling will
allow consumers to support
their local industry, said Rep.
Val Hoyle, D-Eugene.
“If they don’t understand
the difference, they will
just buy the ¿sh that is less
expensive,” she said.
Rep. John Davis, R-Wil-
sonville, said the bill was
premature because the
United States isn’t import-
ing biotech salmon from
Canada until the Food
and Drug Administration
decides whether to require
labeling.
The Oregon ¿shing indus-
try is also free to label its
¿sh as being wild-caught or
non-genetically engineered,
said Rep. Mike Nearman,
R-Dallas.
“There’s simply not a
need for this to be done as a
matter of state law,” he said.
The bill was originally
proposed as a means to give
local governments in Oregon
the power to regulate biotech
crops.
Biotech critics claim that
local ordinances are neces-
sary to prevent cross-polli-
nation between transgenic,
conventional and organic
crops because the state and
federal governments have
failed to act on the issue.
Opponents of the pro-
posal argued that it would
complicate farming across
county lines, reduce crop
options and put a strain
on local governments that
would have to enforce such
ordinances.
However, the origi-
nal language of the bill was
“gutted and stuffed” at the
committee level with a label-
ing requirement for geneti-
cally engineered ¿sh.
While the proposal to
allow local restrictions on
‘I think
they have a
legitimate
issue that
needs to
be solved.
I hope the
Department
of
Agriculture
solves
it or the
Legislature
does in the
future.’
Rep. Paul Holvey
D-Eugene
biotech crops was removed
from the bill, it may get
resurrected
in
future
legislation.
The bill’s sponsor, Rep.
Paul Holvey, D-Eugene, said
he wishes problems could
be worked out amicably, but
farmers who fear cross-pol-
lination from biotech crops
don’t currently have a system
to prevent economic losses.
After the Legislature pre-
empted local regulation of
seeds — including biotech
crops — in 2013, their con-
cern hasn’t been addressed, he
said.
“I think they have a legit-
imate issue that needs to be
solved,” Holvey said during
a previous committee hear-
ing. “I hope the Department
of Agriculture solves it or the
Legislature does in the future.”
Rep. Shemia Fagan,
D-Clackamas, said she hopes
the recent discussions in the
Legislature will pressure the
state Department of Agri-
culture to come up with a
solution.
Fagan noted that heir-
loom crop varieties cannot
be replaced once they’re lost,
so she hopes to give farmers
some method to protect such
cultivars.
“There is some urgency to
this issue,” she said.
Nearman said it would be
unfortunate if the current sys-
tem of voluntary cooperation
among farmers was replaced
with a “bureaucratic solu-
tion” for cross-pollination
concerns.
“They try to solve their
problems by talking with
each other and working with
each other,” Nearman said.
Rep. Susan McLain, D-Hills-
boro, said she agreed that an
ideal solution would allow all
types of farmers to co-exist.
“Let’s not pre-empt that
possible pathway,” she said.
The Capital Bureau is a
collaboration between EO
Media Group and Pamplin
Media Group.
Marine mammal strandings concern experts
By LYRA FONTAINE
EO Media Group
CANNON
BEACH
— The humpback whale
stranded in Seaside in Janu-
ary may have become entan-
gled or struck by a boat,
according to Debbie Duff-
ield, a Portland State Uni-
versity biology professor.
More than 30 people gath-
ered for a lecture, “Marine
Mammals, the Marine Mam-
mal Stranding Network and
Marine Reserves,” last week
at the Cannon Beach Library.
The topic was particularly
timely. In the past few weeks,
a humpback whale washed
ashore in Seaside, and a har-
bor porpoise and two striped
dolphins were found on the
North Coast. Experts are still
waiting on necropsy results
for the whale to see whether
it was infected or if it had an
accident.
The humpback has bruis-
ing that could have been
from entanglement or a boat
strike, Duffield said. It also
carried a fairly heavy par-
asite load for a whale not
more than 2 years old.
The presentation — a
partnership between Duff-
ield and Keith Chandler, the
Seaside Aquarium general
manager — was part of Hay-
stack Rock Awareness Pro-
gram’s lecture series.
The Oregon Marine Mam-
mal Stranding Network,
which Duffield and Chan-
dler belong to, responds to
mammal strandings from
Tillamook to Long Beach,
Washington. They see 149
stranded animals a year on
average. The most common
animals include California
sea lions, harbor seals and
Steller sea lions.
Strandings
allow
researchers to evaluate oth-
erwise inaccessible animals,
and necropsies tell scientists
vital physiological and bio-
logical information. Marine
mammals’ tissues are sam-
pled and used for studies
on ocean pollution, biotox-
ins and other environmental
changes.
Once they evaluate a
stranded animal, research-
ers take samples back to the
university to study it in a
controlled area and test for
infections. After they finish
the necropsies, they might
prepare the bones for stu-
dents to piece together.
“Every once in awhile we
have species that, because of
their charismatic value, are
of great interest to every-
body,” Duffield said.
For example, a killer
whale was stranded in
Long Beach several years
ago, drawing veterinaries,
researchers and onlookers
alike. Duffield also recalls
when a Baird’s beaked
whale came in live in Sea-
side during a volleyball
tournament. “Luckily, peo-
ple weren’t around it when
it started to die and thrash,
because it could have killed
somebody,” she said.
Why do these animals
appear on shores? Seals,
sea lions, whales, dolphins
and porpoises are primarily
stranded due to human inter-
action, such as gunshots,
fisheries interaction and net
entanglement. Bacterial dis-
ease, cancer and infections
also cause strandings.
Sometimes the human-re-
lated
interactions
are
extreme. Duffield displayed
a jarring photo of a Cali-
fornia sea lion that had part
of its face destroyed by an
explosive device.
She also showed a pic-
ture of plastics and debris
on the Seaside beach. Sea
lions get entangled in plas-
tic bands, but since they
bite, it’s difficult for humans
to help them remove bands
and recover from wounds. In
2010, a dead whale stranded
in Washington’s Puget
Sound beach had 50 gal-
lons of material in its stom-
ach that was mostly algae,
but also human debris, such
as sweatpants, plastic bags,
duct tape and towels.
The Oregon Marine Mam-
mal Stranding Network works
to improve treatment and dis-
entangle marine mammals
from debris and ¿shery gear.
Duf¿eld said that the ani-
mals are resilient. Seals and
sea lions often carry worms
in their stomach that can form
ulcers. “They just live with
that,” she said. “Their para-
site loads are tremendous.”
The strandings may also
point to larger forces at work.
The El Niño climate pat-
tern that’s increasing coastal
temperatures, along with the
warm “blob” of water in the
north Pacific Ocean, affect
the animals’ prey.
“We’re at the apex of
these changes that we can
actually follow annually,”
Duffield said. “It’s a fasci-
nating change that we’re liv-
ing through.”
Daily Astorian/File Photo
People stop to look at the dead humpback whale calf that
washed ashore on the Seaside beach.
Lyra Fontaine/EO Media Group
Debbie Duffield of Portland
State University discusses
marine mammal strandings
as part of a Haystack Rock
Awareness Program series.
Lyra Fontaine/EO Media Group
Seaside Aquarium employees Mollie Schmidt and Tiffany
Boothe with Debbie Duffield and Seaside Aquarium Gen-
eral Manager Keith Chandler.
Neal Maine/For EO Media Group
Workmen move the humpback whale that washed ashore
in Seaside.
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ala Dan Reed
Friday Feb. 19 th
4 pm ‘til gone
$ 8.00
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ASTORIA
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Cla t sop Post 12
1132 Exchange Street 325-5771
First Baptist Church
A place where you feel like family...come home.
Announcing Bible Study series titled “Believe”
Led by Reverend Rob Sturdivant
Is God Real? What do I Believe?
Having doubts about God? You are not alone.
Weekly classes start Sunday Feb 21 at 5:30pm-6:30pm
$10 study guide, scholarships available
Soup dinner provided at 5:00, class starts at 5:30
Location: First Baptist Church Astoria, 349 7th Street, across from County Court House
Call (503) 325-1761 to sign up or questions