Boston, MA - Seven activists from Rising Tide Boston disrupted a lecture at Harvard University being delivered by Arch Coal CEO Steve Leer, who was speaking on the future of “clean coal” technology. The activists attempted to enlighten the coal baron and the lecture attendees on the true cost of coal extraction. "Arch coal is participating in the destructive practice of mountaintop removal," says Tyler Kinser, a member of Rising Tide Boston. "How can coal ever be clean when entire communities are being poisoned and displaced by coal extraction?" Read More | Video

The December ice storm that took out power for millions of people across New England and Upstate New York was the worst ice storm to hit our region in a decade. The aftermath, however, was worse than anything we had to deal with following the last big ice storm back in 1998. Hundreds of thousands of people were without power days after the storm, and thousands of people went over a week without power.The absolute bungling of the response by Unitil management has prompted several towns throughout New England to consider getting rid of Unitil all together and forming their own municipal electric utilities.

Astoria, OR - Columbia Riverkeeper and partners won their appeal today when the Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA) overturned Clatsop County's decision to approve the Bradwood Landing liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal and pipeline. "This decision is a victory for healthy communities and clean energy," said Columbia Riverkeeper executive director Brett VandenHeuvel. Read More | columbiariverkeeper.org

Jeffrey Free Luers writes, "Alongside protecting the wild and fostering respect for our planet, one of the tenets of this movement is creating a sustainable future for our communities. In doing so, we must develop communities that have the ability to provide food, water, sanitation, resources and energy in a decentralized and autonomous manner."

Author Antonia Juhasz spoke at King's Books in Tacoma about her latest book, The Tyranny of Oil.

Astoria, OR - Two days after staging a massive rally against LNG in Oregon, opponents of the Bradwood LNG terminal vowed to challenge FERC in federal court after the commission rejected their request for reconsideration of the terminal's approval.

Without discussion, the five-member commission dismissed challenges from the states of Oregon and Washington, as well as Columbia River Treaty Tribes and Columbia Riverkeeper.

Brett VandenHeuvel, executive director of Columbia Riverkeeper, blasted FERC's decision, "FERC's decision is clearly illegal and we will challenge it in federal court. Not only Riverkeeper and allies, but also the states of Oregon and Washington, and the Columbia River tribes all warned FERC that we would fight its illegal approval. I expect we will succeed on appeal."

Clean Energy/Anti-LNG Rally
January 13th, 11AM-1PM on the capitol steps in Salem
Bring your signs, tractors, fishing boats, friends, families and voices.
Help our message to be heard: We want clean, renewable energy -- not more foreign fossil fuels!

Highlights of the event will include:
-Raging Grannies
-Radical Cheerleading
-Speakers ranging from elected officials to grassroots activists
-Street Theater

Take advantage of the warm weather and come see for yourself what will be lost if the Palomar Pipeline is built. The proposed Palomar Pipeline crosses the Clackamas River at one of its most scenic bends.

Sunday, January 11, 9am-5pm

At the halfway mark, we will come to the route of the proposed Palomar Pipeline where it crosses the Wild and Scenic Clackamas River. Bark Timber Sale Committee member and GIS specialist Matt Mavko will describe the impacts of the pipeline proposal and hikers will be given an opportunity to write official comments to the Forest Service about the pipeline.

When will people learn that coal can never be clean? From extraction to disposal, it is one of the most environmentally devastating energy sources in existence. On December 22, 2008, the residents of Roane County, TN received an early Christmas gift from the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). It seems they were quite naughty this past year. However, instead of the simple lump of coal I always dreaded as a child, they got a coal ash slurry. An estimated 400 acres of it.

The nearby Kingston Fossil Plant had been storing coal ash, the solid byproduct of burning coal, since it began operating in 1955. According to the TVA website, the plant burns 14,000 tons of coal a day. That's a total of 271 millions tons of coal. All of the ash from all of that coal is mixed with water and stored in an above ground reservoir. On the Monday before Christmas, one of the 20ft earthen retaining walls encasing the dump site failed sending forth a gray tidal wave removing houses from their foundations and covering over 400 acres in a toxic quagmire. Volume estimates range from 350 to over 500 million gallons. But that is just the beginning.

There are roughly 600 coal fired power plants in the US alone. Clean Energy Rally in Salem Tuesday Jan 13th

Several coastal locations in Oregon are proposed sites for highly explosive liquified natural gas (LNG) terminals, to be brought in to port via large tankers from overseas locations. In addition to legitimate concerns about dredging being destructive to the riparian estuary ecosystems, the highly explosive properties of supercooled natural gas present risks in known seismic areas of the Cascadian subduction zone. Read More | Related: Start a new year for Climate ACTION with Rising Tide

With Bush heading out and Obama coming in, new developments on the LNG front and lots more news about climate and dirty energy politics from around the US and the world, Rising Tide will be kicking off a new year of organizing against the root causes of climate change with a public orientation to our group and the issues on Sunday, January 4th, at 6pm at Red and Black Cafe.

Come hear about the latest developments from December's UN climate meetings, find out about troubling developments in Obama's energy policy, see videos of recent climate direct actions around the US and world as well as footage and stories from the terrifying coal waste disaster in Tennessee last week, and more...

** Friday @ PSU | Sunday @ Black Rose | Monday @ Lewis & Clark | Wednesday @ Reed **

Leonardo Cerda is an Ecuadorian youth climate, energy and sustainability activist studying International Relations and Political Sciences at the Universidad San Francisco de Quito in Ecuador. He'll be discussing his communities work in Ecuador, the damage done by the oil industry, and efforts to build a more just, sustainable society in Ecuador. http://cascadia.risingtidenorthamerica.org

Internationally renown radiation scientist and researcher Dr. Chris Busby speaks about the radioactive waste dumping into New York's Hudson River.

If you’ve been following the ongoing saga of Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant on New York’s Hudson River, you already know about the long history of underground radioactive leaks seeping out of two spent nuclear fuel pools there. It is also possible you might have heard the buzz — or, read, in this “mission accomplished” article that 500,000 gallons of radioactive water has been dumped by Energy Corporation into the Hudson River. The explanation of this dumping process was offered by a July 31, 2008 report called the “Indian Point Independent Safety Evaluation”... Read More

Related: Comment Period for Global Nuclear Energy Partnership has begun — In the dying throes of the Bush administration, one last environmental disaster is being foisted on the public. With the GNEP, nuclear waste facilities in New Mexico and Hanford, WA would get a lot more nuclear waste (both from within and outside the country) and a dirty nuclear waste 'reprocessing' plant. Read More from Alliance for Nuclear Accountability | Map of US Reactors

Will major power line expansions allow the waste industry to burn more out-of-state trash so Boston and New York can have more cheap electricity? Even though Maine is a major exporter of electricity, people in Maine already pay some of the highest electricity rates in the Northeast — will a $1.4 billion upgrade lower these rates? What can locals expect in return? Will it be land seizures through eminent domain, and more trash-burning disguised as "clean" "green" biomass energy?

Global Nuclear Energy Partnership = More Waste to Hanford

Condemned by health and environmental groups across the country, GNEP means foreign nuclear waste imported and "reprocessed" to USA for more plants. The only public meeting in Oregon by DOE about its Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, is in Hood River at 7 PM Tuesday, November 18 at the Hood River Inn, exit 64 from Portland. CARPOOL or take FREE BUS (see below). This is a national issue. We need a big Oregon outcry. 20 years behind on clean-up, Hanford cannot accept more waste!!!

Public Hearings on Southern Oregon LNG Pipeline - October 27th-30th

Meeting times and dates are below, ore information on the terminal and pipeline can be found at: Citizen's Against LNG and No California Pipeline and LNG Pollutes.

We will be holding a rally to show our opposition to the proposed coal-fired power plant in Hempstead County. After a recent decision by the Governors Commission on Global Warming to halt construction on this plant it is important we show Governor Beebe that he has the public support to move forward with the recommendation of his own commission and stop this plant.

About 100 people attended a Rally on the steps of the Capital building in Olympia Washington today, October 6, 2008, urging Governor Chris Gregoire to mount a legal challenge to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's (FERC) approval of the Bradwood Liquefied Natural Gas terminal. The Rally was moderated by Dan Serres of Columbia Riverkeeper, who introduced a wide variety of speakers. Speakers included, from Washington State government, Rep. Dean Takko from Southern Oregon and Jay Manning, Director of Washington Department of Ecology. From Washington State citizen organizations concerned about the detrimental effects of the proposal were Ruby Wolf of the Cascade chapter of the Sierra Club, George Exum of Wahkiakum Friends of the Columbia River, Gerald Pollet, Seattle City Light Study Group and Gail, a forest land owner.

Also speaking were Monica of Rising Tide North America and Olivia Schmidt from the Columbia River Clean Energy Coalition. | | | Hands Across the Columbia

Why solve one major problem when you can solve three? Clean energy is the answer to America's biggest questions. By focusing on a renewable energy future, we can decrease our dependence on expensive fossil fuels, create millions of new green jobs, and stop global warming.

There will be a rally at the WA State Capitol on Monday, Oct. 6 to urge Washington Governor Chris Gregoire to direct her agencies to reject the Bradwood LNG terminal and pipeline. Gregoire has indicated that Washington State will challenge FERC's approval of the project, and participants in the rally welcome this decision. However, the Washington's agencies have the authority to block the project outright, and we will request that the Governor and her agencies do so.