Category: Commentary

Source: James Conca, Forbes, Feb 27, 2020 On January 15, the Washington State Senate voted 26-23 to pass SB 5811, that essentially mandates that automakers dedicate a certain portion of their vehicle sales in the state to fully electric vehicles (EVs) by 2022, and that all new vehicles sold in the state must be electric by 2030. At the same time, our House passed HB1110, […]

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Washington has enormously benefited from Boeing over the years. We should appreciate that — even in hard times.

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Source: Jim Conca, Forbes, Feb 18, 2020 The new DOE 2021 Federal budget request came out last week at $35.4 billion, down from 2020’s $38.5 billion. There were some nice surprises, but also some same old stupid ideas. Good surprises included increased funding for advanced reactors, reprocessing of spent fuel (but then why did we […]

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Source: Tri-City Herald Editorial Board, Feb 16, 2020 If state lawmakers truly care about helping our beloved orcas thrive, then they will find a way to support a study that would boost hatchery fish production in Puget Sound. Sen. Ann Rivers, R- La Center, told the Tri-City Herald that “where there’s a will, there’s a […]

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Source: Joe Fitzgibbon, Seattle Times, Feb 11 2020 The last six years have been the hottest ever recorded. It’s only getting hotter. We’ve heard the roar of climate change from afar, but now it’s in our backyards. Each summer, wildfires rip across the Pacific Northwest with smoke thick enough that for several days in 2018, […]

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Source: Emmett FitzGerald, 99% Invisible, Radiotopia, Feb 4, 2020 If you heard that there was a piece of technology that could do away with traffic jams, make cities more equitable, and help us solve climate change, you might think about driverless cars, or hyperloops or any of the other new transportation technologies that get lots […]

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Source: Forbes, James Conca, Feb 4, 2020 While many states have announced they want to be net-zero carbon by 2040 or so, Washington State is likely to achieve it. Of course, it helps that we already have the lowest carbon footprint of any state in the Union. With 86% hydro, nuclear and wind as our electricity […]

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Source: James Conca, Forbes, Jan 20, 2020 I had the good fortune to talk with Professor Sharon Squassoni in the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University. Her research at the Institute for International Science and Technology Policy includes reducing risks from nuclear weapons and nuclear energy, particularly those related to nuclear material and fuel […]

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Source: Kara Swisher, New York Times, Jan 23, 2020 Is a “decarbonized” future possible? That’s what Microsoft promised it would aim for when it pledged this week to go carbon negative by 2030. It added that it would attempt by 2050 to “remove from the environment all the carbon the company has emitted either directly or by electrical consumption […]

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Source: James Conca, Forbes, Jan 15, 2020 The House Committee on Energy and Commerce, chaired by Frank Pallone, Jr (D-NJ), released an ambitious new climate plan to ensure the United States achieves net-zero greenhouse gas pollution by 2050. Supported by Environment and Climate Change Subcommittee Chairman Paul Tonko (D-NY) and Energy Subcommittee Chairman Bobby L. Rush (D-IL), […]

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