Another Green Monday
As you must know by now we’ve been doing a weekly radio show on KYRS for six months (exactly six months today actually) - fittingly it's called Down To Earth. And if you don’t, it’s on KYRS (89.9 and 92.3 in the Spokane area) every Monday morning from 7 – 7:45 and always available via podcast at kyrs.org and on this blog as well. It’s been a great experience thus far and we hope you’ve enjoyed the range of topics we’ve discussed and the diversity of perspectives we’ve brought in with the numerous guests we’ve had.
That said, we’re extra excited about this morning's show (6/7/10), and we wanted to remind all of you about it so you didn’t miss it. In the studio we’ll have Brad Hash of the Sierra Club. Brad works out of Missoula on the Sierra Club’s “Beyond Coal” campaign and we’ll spend the 45 minutes talking about coal in the Northwest. For many in Eastern Washington, it comes as a surprise just how much we depend on coal and how harmful that is. Being that we’re such a hydroelectric power-centric region, Brad’s work is as important here in Spokane and the Inland Northwest as ever. We’re thrilled to be able to raise awareness for his work and the “Beyond Coal” campaign.
So don’t forget to tune in to KYRS (89.9, 92.3 and streaming at kyrs.org) to hear Brad's remarkable stories about mountaintop coal removal in West Virginia, his political work and grassroots organizing, and the need for clean energy development.
And on June 16th, from 7-9pm in the Community Building (35 W. Main), Brad will be hosting a dialogue on how eastern Washington can phase out coal use - no easy task today since coal is the workhorse of the nation's electric power industry, supplying more than half the electricity consumed by Americans.
If you can’t get up early enough to tune in or you forget, the show will be available for podcast and streaming audio HERE and HERE.
After the jump are some stories you might have missed last week
So how messed up are you? The askers of this question aren't being inconsiderate, they're serious - they want to know just how unhealthy people that grew up in Libby, Montana are. That's why researchers have embarked on an ambitious study to track the health of thousands of high school graduates over a half century in a Montana town where a toxic mine has killed hundreds of people and made it the deadliest Superfund site in the nation according to the AP. Read more HERE.
May 12th - a day that blew. In a good way. For it was May 12th that wind turbines operated by the Bonneville Power Administration generated more energy than expected and actually caused hydroelectric dam operators to dial back their flows. In a story in the Missoulian, it was said that "It signaled a major shift in the way power is delivered in the Pacific Northwest, and served as proof of the faster and more flexible system that is evolving to accommodate today's renewable energy sources." Read more HERE.
