GOLDENDALE: YES OR NO?
To solve the climate crisis, we need facilities like the Goldendale pumped storage project that allow us to store intermittent renewable energy for later use. As a longtime resident of Goldendale, Washington, and lifelong renewable energy advocate, I was disappointed that your recent article left out critical information (“The consultation trap,” July 2024).
The site in question has been heavily disturbed for decades. It includes areas that are contaminated but will be remediated as part of the project. It is also privately owned ceded land, requiring anyone to contact the landowner to access it.
I very much hope that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission awards this site a license in the coming months to move our town and the Pacific Northwest forward.
Dana Peck
Goldendale, Washington
Thanks for your in-depth reporting and article in HCN about the Yakama Nation and its struggle against the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s approval of the Goldendale project. The entire situation smacks of subtle racism. So degrading, so demeaning, so unnecessary. Just keep up the great work!
Lynne Waltke
Tucson, Arizona
BIRDS OF A FEATHER
Thank you for the insightful article on how a tiny shorebird might save the Great Salt Lake (“The Tiny Bird that Could Save an Ecosystem,” July 2024). I was glad to see that Terry Tempest Williams lent her prestige to the effort. The Great Salt Lake is a Hemispheric Reserve in the Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve Network, which is a critical environment for not only phalaropes, but also about 15 other long-distance migrants. I’m afraid that the only thing that will force ranchers in the upper Bear River drainage to cut back on alfalfa irrigation for their cattle and sheep will be when people in Salt Lake City start dying from inhaling toxic saline dust.
Chuck Trost
Pocatello, Idah
Kudos to Caroline Tracey for her article. She drew together people from Utah, Argentina and Spanish-speaking high schoolers in California with the biology and history of this tiny bird. Likely the best-written article I have read in your publication.
@pdxbluespruce via
Instagram
GOOD DOG
I love, love, love Nina McConigley’s essay, “Prairie dog,” in the July 2024 issue.
Linda Paul
Boise, Idaho
DATA CENTER DOOMSVILLE
I’d like to add an interesting twist to the article “Data centers could set back climate progress” (June 27, 2024). Very few people work inside these enormous buildings. I was an engineer at Hewlett Packard and visited a data center in northern Virginia about 15 years ago. During visits to solve technical problems, there would be just three — 3! — people in the huge multi-acre buildings, not including myself and a co-worker. Everything is monitored remotely.
The local employment opportunities are nil. This is the dirty secret about data centers and huge processing facilities. Few or no residents of the local area will benefit.
David Lobato
Baltimore, Maryland
Excellent article! I learned a lot, and it definitely moved my understanding of how renewables actually play in the power picture — basically handling the growth, not the base. And we must change the base to address the climate impacts.
Great work, HCN!
Scott Smith
Depoe Bay, Oregon
UNALAKLEET OR BUST
What a great piece of writing Laureli Ivanoff did there about her all-girl seal-hunting crew (“All-lady seal-hunting crew,” May 2024). I have lived in Unalakleet and really got there in her writing. More. More. More.
John Tetpon
Anchorage, Alaska
DON’T FENCE ME IN, OR OUT
The picture accompanying the article “Pronghorn among the panels” (June 2024) begs a question: Why erect a high fence around a solar installation? Indeed, why a fence at all? Why not allow wildlife to move freely through it? I’m sure there are reasons, but I’ll bet they are not very good reasons.
Jim Joseph
Brethren, Michigan
REPATRIATION AT LAST
Thank you for the article you wrote many years ago about illegal excavations in our homelands on BLM property (“A whistleblower speaks out over excavation of Native sites,” December 2020). I’m happy to report that, due to this article and lots of collaboration with BLM staff archaeologists, we have finally repatriated the human remains and funeral objects.
This was the longest NAGPRA, Cal-NAGPRA case I’ve ever been a part of, and how much cover-up was implemented was eye-opening.
Waylon Coats
Vice chairman and tribal archaeologist, Southern Sierra Miwuk Tribe
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