A2
THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 2020
IN BRIEF
Ocean Park woman killed
in crash east of Astoria
An Ocean Park, Washington, woman was killed on
Thursday morning in a crash on U.S. Highway 30 about
5 miles east of Astoria.
Emilee Mabey, 24, was driving a Buick LeSa-
bre westbound at about 11:15 a.m. when her vehicle
crossed the centerline into the path of an eastbound
semitruck, the Oregon State Police said.
The driver of the truck, a Portland man, was not
injured.
Highway 30 was closed for several hours. Drivers
were urged to avoid the area near milepost 92 or expect
long delays.
The highway reopened to traffi c about 2:30 p.m.
Warrenton celebrates 121st birthday
Warrenton is hosting a party for the city’s 121st
birthday.
The city will hold a gathering from 1 to 3 p.m. on
Tuesday in the City Commission chambers inside City
Hall at 225 S. Main Ave. to celebrate the city’s incorpo-
ration Feb. 11, 1899.
There will be cupcakes, coffee, historical photos and
other information about the past and future of the city.
— The Astorian
State Route 4 slide stable, despite rain
Though continually wet weather raised concerns
that a large landslide on State Route 4 would shift again
and halt cleanup efforts, state offi cials said Thursday
that the slope appeared stable.
Washington State Department of Transportation
spokeswoman Kathryn Garcia-Stackpole said the slope
was stable as of Thursday afternoon, and that crews
hoped to start installing safety barriers soon.
The department’s goal is to reopen a single lane to
traffi c to end the closure in place since the Jan. 23 slide
occurred. While that may happen as soon as next week,
much still depends on the weather, Garcia-Stackpole said.
Safety barriers are necessary to protect passing traf-
fi c while crews continue to remove the 50,000 cubic
yards of soil, rock and trees that slid down the fl ank off
KM Mountain. The slide closed the highway about 9
miles west of Cathlamet.
In the meantime, travelers can use U.S. Highway 30
as an alternate route by crossing the Lewis and Clark
Bridge in Longview or the Astoria Bridge in Astoria.
The Wahkiakum County ferry Oscar B is running
free of charge on a 24/7 schedule until a single lane is
reopened, according to the state.
— The Daily News
Gov. Brown backs wildfi re bill
SALEM — One of the ambitious new measures put
forward during the Oregon Legislature’s short session
is Gov. Kate Brown’s wildfi re bill.
Brown told the Senate Committee on Wildfi re
Reduction and Recovery that lawmakers shouldn’t lose
their sense of urgency just because last year’s fi re sea-
son was relatively mild.
“We got lucky. But it’s not likely to happen again,”
she said. “We must be prepared for the more voracious
wildfi re seasons to come.”
Senate Bill 1536 is a sweeping effort to strengthen
wildfi re response, boost fuel reduction work in the woods
and help communities become more wildfi re-resilient.
The governor said her wildfi re council estimates it
will cost $200 million a year for the next 20 years to get
wildfi res in Oregon down to a tolerable level.
“Doing nothing is not an option,” Brown said. “Stud-
ies suggest the comprehensive costs of wildfi re are 11
times greater than the immediate costs of fi refi ghting.”
Among other things, the bill would help pay for fuel
reduction treatments on as many as 300,000 acres each
year. It would toughen building codes to increase fi re
resistance and set standards for defensible space around
buildings.
It would also require utilities to make their electri-
cal transmission systems less likely to spark wildfi res.
— Oregon Public Broadcasting
ON THE RECORD
DUII
On
the
Record
• Lacey
Anne Melo-Santiago,
32, of Seaside, was
arrested Friday on 41st Street and Lief Erikson Drive
in Astoria for driving under the infl uence of intoxi-
cants. Her blood alcohol content was 0.16%.
PUBLIC MEETINGS
MONDAY
Cannon Beach Rural Fire Department Board, 6 p.m.,
Fire-Rescue Main Station, 188 Sunset Ave.
Youngs River Lewis & Clark Water District Board, 6 p.m.,
34583 U.S. Highway 101 Business.
Seaside City Council, 7 p.m., 989 Broadway.
TUESDAY
Lewis & Clark Fire Department Board, 6 p.m., main fi re
station, 34571 U.S. Highway 101 Business.
Warrenton City Commission, 6 p.m., City Hall, 225 S. Main
Ave.
PUBLIC MEETINGS
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Washington state adds
fuel to climate change fi re
Debate across the
Pacifi c Northwest
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
OLYMPIA, Wash. —
The Washington Legislature
has mandated renewable
electricity, subsidized the
purchase of electric vehi-
cles and dictated how much
energy air compressors,
generators and other equip-
ment can use.
That was last year.
This session, Gov. Jay
Inslee is urging lawmakers
to get even more ambitious.
Democratic legislators are
advancing, at the governor’s
request, several major cli-
mate change bills.
One would require more
renewable fuels in gasoline
and diesel, a measure that
farm groups say will drive
up their production and
transportation costs.
Another would appar-
ently give the state Depart-
ment of Ecology the power,
if it chose to use it, to reg-
ulate anything that gives
off measurable amounts of
greenhouse gases, includ-
ing tractors and other farm
equipment.
And just last week, state
Sen. Reuven Carlyle, D-Se-
attle, re introduced a cap-
and-trade bill, the controver-
sial policy aimed at reducing
the amount of greenhouse
gas that goes into the atmo-
sphere as a way to slow cli-
mate change.
The legislative session
has fi ve weeks to go.
In mid-January, when the
session began, Inslee said
the need for action on cli-
mate change was a foregone
conclusion.
“There should be no
more debate in the state of
Washington about this sub-
ject, or in the Legislature,”
the governor said.
‘Clarion call’
Soon after the Legisla-
ture convened, the Washing-
ton Supreme Court issued a
long-awaited ruling.
In a 5-4 decision, the
court said Ecology couldn’t
hold oil and natural gas
companies responsible for
the greenhouse gases emit-
ted when their customers
used their products.
The ruling gutted the Ins-
lee administration’s Clean
Air Rule. “This ruling will
signifi cantly affect our abil-
ity to reduce emissions,” the
governor said the day the
ruling came out.
If the rule had stood, nat-
ural gas distributors and
petroleum producers and
importers would have had
to reduce their emissions
or buy emission-reduction
credits to make up for what
their customers released by
such activities as heating
their homes.
The Washington Farm
Bureau had joined other
business groups in the law-
suit challenging the rule.
The court’s majority agreed
that Ecology had author-
ity to regulate only actual
emissions, not indirect
emissions.
Although the ruling was
a setback for his administra-
tion, Inslee quickly turned to
the majority opinion’s com-
ments on climate change.
Chief Justice Debra Ste-
phens wrote that the case
was not about the “unde-
niable crisis of climate
Photos by Don Jenkins/Capital Press
State Sen. Reuven Carlyle, D-Seattle, speaks to an environmental rally in Olympia in January.
Farmers parked tractors at the Capitol in Olympia in January.
change.” The problem,
according to Stephens, was
that Ecology exceeded the
powers the Legislature
had given it under the state
Clean Air Act.
“The issue is not whether
man-made climate change
is real — it is,” she wrote.
“Nor is the issue whether
dramatic steps are needed to
curb the worst effects of cli-
mate change — they are.”
Said Inslee: “I couldn’t
say it with more fervor or
accuracy.”
“We’ll take this as a clar-
ion call for more action, and
I’m happy to sally forward,”
the governor said. “The
venue now for that dramatic
action is the Legislature this
year.”
House and Senate Dem-
ocrats have now introduced
bills to give Ecology the
authority to regulate indirect
emissions.
At a Senate Environ-
ment, Energy and Technol-
ogy Committee hearing,
Chris Davis, Inslee’s senior
policy adviser on climate,
described Ecology’s current
powers as “incomplete.”
Sen. Doug Ericksen,
R-Ferndale, asked what
qualifi es as an indirect emit-
ter. “A lawn mower, leaf
blower ... a farmer’s trac-
tor?” he asked.
Later, he restated the
question: “Would indirect
include beef cattle or dairy
cattle?”
The House and Senate
bills do not defi ne indirect
emissions. At a hearing last
year, Supreme Court jus-
tices had the same question:
If Ecology can regulate indi-
rect emissions, what can’t it
regulate?
The lawyer arguing the
case for Ecology, Laura
Watson, who has since been
promoted to the depart-
ment’s director, said Ecol-
ogy would be limited by its
inability to precisely mea-
sure some things.
She cited greenhouse
gases from livestock as an
example — although Ecol-
ogy does estimate emissions
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from enteric fermentation,
the digestive processes of
livestock.
Responding to a hypo-
thetical question, Watson
agreed that Ecology would
be able to regulate green-
house gases from wood
stoves. “The point of regula-
tion would be with the wood
seller,” she said.
In the dissenting opinion,
Justice Susan Owens wrote
that Ecology’s ability to reg-
ulate only the emissions it
can measure was a reason-
able limiting principle.
Stephens’ majority opin-
ion, however, issued a
warning, and not about cli-
mate change. She wrote:
“Left unchecked, Ecology’s
expansive
interpretation
of its own authority would
sweep many newly branded
‘indirect emitters’ into the
regulatory web.”
Cleaner fuels
Inslee is also urging law-
makers to follow Califor-
nia and Oregon and adopt a
low-carbon fuel standard.
The policy seeks to
reduce the carbon intensity
of gasoline and diesel. Car-
bon intensity measures the
greenhouse gases given off
in producing, distributing
and consuming a fuel.
Every source of power
can be scored for its car-
bon intensity. Pure gasoline
and diesel have high scores.
Electricity, which primarily
comes from dams, has a low
score. Ethanol and biodiesel
are in between.
The policy creates a mar-
ket: suppliers of high-car-
bon fossil fuels must buy
credits from suppliers of
low-carbon renewable fuels.
The market effectively
taxes high-carbon fuels and
subsidizes low-carbon fuels,
according to the California
Legislative Analyst’s Offi ce.
However, the public
eventually pays the cost,
according to the offi ce’s
2018 assessment of the pro-
gram. “These higher costs
have real adverse effects
on households,” the report
stated.
To highlight one poten-
tial effect on agriculture,
three farmers testifi ed to the
Senate environment com-
mittee that gas mixed with
ethanol increases equipment
maintenance. They said they
already pay a premium for
pure gasoline.
“This is so important we
pay about 40 cents per gal-
lon extra to have non etha-
nol fuel on the farm,” said
Mike Clayton, who grows
apples and cherries near
Lake Chelan.
Reed Schuler, another
senior policy adviser on
climate in the governor’s
offi ce, said a low-carbon
fuel standard is a top prior-
ity for Inslee. Transporta-
tion is the No. 1 source of
carbon emissions in Wash-
ington. “We do not have any
other tools to do as much as
cheaply to reduce carbon
pollution from transporta-
tion,” Schuler said.
Under Inslee’s proposal,
transportation fuels would
have to be 20% less carbon
intensive by 2035. The stan-
dard would be phased in. As
time went on, the policy’s
infl uence on pump prices
would increase.
Although
California
adopted the policy in 2011
and Oregon in 2015, both
states are many years away
from fully implementing
their standards — a 20%
reduction in carbon intensity
by 2030 for California and a
10% reduction by 2025 for
Oregon.
Whatever the percent-
age, the impact will show up
at the pump as higher fuel
prices.
By 2030, California’s
policy could add as much
as 36 cents per gallon at
the pump for gasoline and
44 cents to a gallon for die-
sel, according to a 2018
staff report by the state’s Air
Resources Board.
The Oregon Department
of Environmental Quality
has not made a long-range
projection on fuel prices.
California’s
Air
Resources Board report
also estimated that state and
local governments will col-
lect $889 million more in
sales taxes between 2019
and 2030 as the cost of con-
sumer goods rises because
of higher fuel costs.
Eastern Washington tree
fruit grower Ben Buchholz
told the Senate environment
committee that after labor,
fuel is the biggest expense
for his family’s farm. He
said a low-carbon fuel stan-
dard would cost his farm
several thousand dollars a
year.
“It may not seem like
much money to some peo-
ple, but my dad and I each
took home less than the
state’s minimum wage this
year from the farm,” said
Buchholz, who’s also exec-
utive director of the North-
west Agricultural Coopera-
tive Council.
Buchholz
said
the
low-carbon fuel standard
would hit drivers like a
regressive gas tax. “It will
hurt my family and our
employees harder than those
taking home larger incomes
and commuting shorter dis-
tances in urban areas,” he
said.
Inslee dismisses claims
that pump prices will rise
much, if at all. “I don’t buy
that bilge from the Republi-
can Party,” he said.
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