Enviro Updates

SuzanneFebruary 24, 2023February 25, 2023Climate Change & Energygeothermal, renewable energy, The Geysers

3 new-tech geothermal plans to be considered for boosting power at The Geysers

Jeff Quackenbush, NORTH BAY BUSINESS JOURNAL

Three cutting-edge technologies that could give California a big boost in always-generating emission-free electricity are being eyed for pilot projects in and around massive geothermal field straddling Sonoma, Lake and Mendocino counties.

The Sonoma Clean Power board, made up of public officials from city and county governments the utility serves in Sonoma and Mendocino counties, on March 2 is set to consider cooperation agreements with Canada-based Eavor Technologies, Chevron New Energies and Salt Lake City-based Cyrq Energy. Each agreement calls for building a demonstration power project, each capable of generating up to 20 megawatts If successful, each plan would scale up to production of 200 megawatts.

The agency’s Community Advisory Committee on Feb. 16 recommended board approval of the agreements.

If the three pilot projects are successful, the full-scale projects producing a combined 600 megawatts would move California toward its goal of 1,160 megawatts of new geothermal power generation over the next five years. It would also increase by 85% the current roughly 700 megawatts of power output from existing plants in The Geysers.

SuzanneFebruary 15, 2023February 25, 2023Climate Change & Energydevelopment, fire, wildfire evacuation, wildland urban interface

Op-Ed: California’s problems won’t be solved by building in wild areas

THE WASHINGTON POST

The Feb. 10 news article “Gentrification by fire” raised valid points but did not address some important issues on building housing in California’s wildland-urban interface.

California’s policies concerning development in the wildland-urban interface are incoherent. The Board of Forestry and Fire Protection, whose members are appointed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), has issued minimum fire-safe regulations. For more than 30 years, the rules have required roads accessing new development to be wide enough so that incoming firefighting apparatus and fleeing civilians can pass each other concurrently. New development on dead-end roads more than a mile long is forbidden. In the past two years, the board was heavily lobbied by counties (including Sonoma County) and developers opposing road limitations for building in the wildland-urban interface, and the board proposed to eviscerate the regulations to allow commercial and residential development in fire-prone areas without safe evacuation routes. This approach failed when a group of retired firefighters lambasted the board’s willingness to jeopardize the safety of firefighters and the public.

Sound regulations remain in place, but the state does not enforce them, letting local jurisdictions ignore many of their protections. California’s housing crisis will not be solved by building in fire-prone rural areas; rather housing needs should be addressed by building as infill near transit hubs and safe evacuation routes.

Deborah A. Eppstein, Santa Rosa, Calif.

The writer is founding director of the State Alliance for Firesafe Road Regulations.

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/02/15/california-building-wild-areas-fire-danger/

SuzanneFebruary 10, 2023February 25, 2023Climate Change & Energyfire, income inequality, rebuilding after fire

Gentrification by fire

Scott Wilson, THE WASTHINGTON POST

The West’s new climate is exacerbating housing inequality in the quintessentially blue state of California.

Many of the victims have been left without adequate insurance or financial means to rebuild. Those who remained are in large part the well-off and the well-insured, a trend helping remake and re-sort communities across the state by rich and poor.

SANTA ROSA, Calif. — Climate change and its most extreme consequences are pushing up the price of homes throughout much of the American West, as fires and flooding carve into existing housing stock and restrict the amount of land suitable for future building.

Over several harrowing weeks in October 2017, the Tubbs Fire swept over this city’s eastern hills to destroy about 5,600 homes, an estimated 5 percent of the region’s already threadbare housing stock. Twenty-two people died in the flames.

It was the first mega-fire of California’s new mega-fire era, a flashing red light along the West’s path into a new climate. The Tubbs Fire was also the start of a new kind of economic gentrification, one caused by the increasingly harmful effects of climate change, the higher costs of rebuilding and insuring homes in fire-prone areas, and a housing stock diminished by fire and flooding.

The results have undermined California’s push to build more affordable housing, a goal set by Gov. Gavin Newsom and the rest of a state Democratic leadership, whose political ethic has made a priority of narrowing the gap between rich and poor, an imbalance particularly pronounced in the nation’s most populous state.

SuzanneDecember 25, 2022February 25, 2023Climate Change & Energyairport, electricity grid, EV charging stations, PG&E

Sonoma County airport electric-car-rental plan faces power-supply bottleneck

Jeff Quackenbush, NORTH BAY BUSINESS JOURNAL

A plan for electric-vehicle fast chargers at an envisioned new car-rental facility at the Charles M. Schulz–Sonoma County Airport has hit a speed bump: A power provider says it could take several years to provide the large amount of electricity those chargers require.

The facility proposal is being updated for EV rentals to fit with California’s recently accelerated push to electrify transportation to cut emissions.

But a local bottleneck in the electrical grid has the project team exploring ways to lessen the anticipated multi-megawatt power demand from chargers needed to quickly get returned EVs ready for the next renter.

Plans for the consolidated rent-a-car facility have been in motion since late 2019, according to documents presented to the Board of Supervisors early this year. The five rental companies operating at the county-run airport want to increase the number of vehicles available and add joint services such as fueling stations for the fleets, automated car wash and a shop for light maintenance.

SuzanneNovember 21, 2022November 23, 2022Agriculture/Food System, Sonoma Coast, Wildlifecrab season, Dungeness crab, Endangered Species Act, fisheries, whales

California commercial Dungeness crab harvest again delayed

Mary Callahan, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

The commercial harvest of Dungeness crab off the North Coast and Central California has once again been delayed due to large groups of federally protected humpback whales still foraging in the fishing grounds.

They’re fewer in number than in late October, when state Fish and Wildlife Director Chuck Bonham first hit pause on the season’s start. But the whales still remain at concentrations high enough to raise the risk of ensnaring them in fishing gear if the fleet were to deploy the thousands of traps used each season.

The whales also exceed thresholds established three years ago to more closely manage the commercial fishery in a way that reduces entanglement of marine mammals protected under the Endangered Species Act — notably blue and humpback whales and leatherback sea turtles.

SuzanneNovember 21, 2022November 23, 2022ForestsCalfire, Guerneville, Guerneville Forest Coalition, logging

Opponents likely headed to court to block newly approved timber operation between Guerneville and Monte Rio

Mary Callahan, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Cal Fire has approved plans for selective logging of redwood and Douglas fir trees on 224 acres above the lower Russian River between Guerneville and Monte Rio, raising the prospect of legal action by opponents who hope they still might prevent the Silver Estates harvest from going forward.

The state agency granted approval late last week after months of public scrutiny, plan revisions and state delays that critics say reflect the proposal’s fundamentally flawed nature.

But in a Nov. 17 letter, Eric Huff, staff chief of Cal Fire’s Forest Practice Program, said the final version — some 500 pages of reports, descriptions, maps and other information — conforms with state Forest Practice Rules. The decision authorizes landowner Roger Burch and his family to carry out its provisions any time over the next five years.

What happens next appears to depend in large part on whether Burch and his representatives decide to begin operations this winter, within the restrictions permitted for the traditional wet weather season.

SuzanneOctober 30, 2022October 31, 2022Waterendangered species, groundwater, Russian River, water diversion, wells

Op-Ed: Busting the myth of limitless groundwater

Sean Bothwell & Don McEnhill, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Facing another drought year and the reality that inadequate groundwater management is leading to a race to the bottom, on Oct. 4, the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors took a critical step toward sustainable water management by placing a temporary pause on issuance of new well permits.

The supervisors deserve credit for recognizing that groundwater is not limitless, and that the health of communities, rivers and local economies depend on sustainable and equitable management. Over the next six months, while the pause is in place, the county will develop science-based rules to govern groundwater well permits to ensure impacts of pumping on neighboring streams and downstream users are accounted for and addressed.

All Sonoma County residents have a stake in improving groundwater management. This is the county’s chance to change course and ensure we are better prepared for a warmer future.

During the current drought, California is facing the long-term limits of our water resources. States, including California, are discussing how to reduce Colorado River water use to a sustainable level, and vast regions of Central and Northern California face severely overtapped groundwater supplies.

California law has long maintained a fictional distinction between regulated diversions from rivers and lakes, and unregulated groundwater pumping. The problem is that nature does not make this distinction. In much of California, groundwater pumping simply sucks water out of rivers from below, through their gravel beds. In some places, excessive groundwater pumping literally causes rivers to run dry.

SuzanneOctober 23, 2022October 30, 2022Climate Change & Energy, Transportationbike lanes, safe streets

Op-Ed: Santa Rosa needs protected bike lanes

Adrian Covert & Alexa Forrester, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

What if we told you there was a cheap and easy way to reduce traffic in Santa Rosa by as much as 25%?

It’s called Class IV protected bike lanes.

Every day, about a quarter of all car trips in Santa Rosa are less than 2 miles. That’s about a 10-minute bike ride for the average adult, comparable to the amount of time it would take to drive that same distance and park. For these small trips, biking is a time-competitive and virtually free alternative to cars that also strengthens physical fitness and generally creates good community vibes (join the Taco Tuesday Ride from Humboldt Park to Mitote Food Park if you don’t believe us). Bikes are also quiet, clean and require little public space.

Yet just 1.6% of all trips in Santa Rosa are made by bike. Bikes are used about six times less often in Santa Rosa than in San Luis Obispo, and 16 times less often than in Davis. Despite its comparatively miserable weather, Amsterdam residents are 24 times more likely to bike to their destination than Santa Rosa residents.

This is an infrastructure problem. Santa Rosa’s bike lanes are almost entirely made up of Class II bikeways — painted lines along the shoulder of a road. Riding mere feet away from increasingly distracted drivers behind the wheels of increasingly large vehicles is neither safe nor pleasant. Since 2012, nearly 500 cyclists have been injured by cars in Santa Rosa, including two who were killed. Small wonder cycling in the city is limited to the most fearless riders.

Santa Rosa could have as many as 24,000 new homes by 2050. To avoid the city becoming choked with car traffic, we must provide safe biking and scooting infrastructure for those who want that option, especially for short trips.

SuzanneOctober 5, 2022October 5, 2022Waterag water use, drought, streams, sustainable water use, well ordinance, wells

Sonoma County Board of Supervisors approves temporary halt in new wells

Emma Murphy, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Supervisor James Gore, whose north county district includes some of the county’s most prolific wine grape growing areas, voted against the moratorium.

The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors has imposed a six-month halt in all new wells countywide, a far-reaching move likely to impact residential and commercial property owners seeking to tap groundwater amid a historic drought.

The immediate drilling moratorium, which offers only a narrow exemption for emergency water needs, is meant to give the county more time to draw up a new set of well regulations aimed to safeguard surface and subsurface flows in the county’s major watersheds.

A 2021 lawsuit by the environmental group California Coastkeeper Alliance spurred the work toward new regulations, and the Board of Supervisors was scheduled to vote on the new rules Tuesday.

Instead, after hours of deliberation over a proposed well ordinance that would have established new requirements reflecting updated state policy for well permit applicants, the board voted 4-1 to impose a moratorium, seeking to buy time for additional work.

Supervisors cited concerns including the potential impact the ordinance would have on agricultural users, and potential legal ramifications connected to California’s environmental quality laws. The new regulations could affect any wells countywide that come under a new application or are up for renewal.

SuzanneOctober 2, 2022Climate Change & Energy, Sustainable Livingall-electric, native landscaping, solar community, stormwater runoff

This 100% solar community endured Hurricane Ian with no loss of power and minimal damage

Rachel Ramirez, CNN

Anthony Grande moved away from Fort Myers three years ago in large part because of the hurricane risk. He has lived in southwest Florida for nearly 19 years, had experienced Hurricanes Charley in 2004 and Irma in 2017 and saw what stronger storms could do to the coast.

Grande told CNN he wanted to find a new home where developers prioritized climate resiliency in a state that is increasingly vulnerable to record-breaking storm surge, catastrophic wind and historic rainfall.

What he found was Babcock Ranch — only 12 miles northeast of Fort Myers, yet seemingly light years away.

Babcock Ranch calls itself “America’s first solar-powered town.” Its nearby solar array — made up of 700,000 individual panels — generates more electricity than the 2,000-home neighborhood uses, in a state where most electricity is generated by burning natural gas, a planet-warming fossil fuel.

The streets in this meticulously planned neighborhood were designed to flood so houses don’t. Native landscaping along roads helps control storm water. Power and internet lines are buried to avoid wind damage. This is all in addition to being built to Florida’s robust building codes.