In the Media

The Deschutes National Forest has completed reconstruction work on the Wyeth Boat Launch on the upper portion of the Deschutes River.

Central Oregon’s beer scene has grown up while the region’s water woes have intensified. As local water managers seek to balance the growing demand for a shrinking resource, the brewing industry has come under the microscope.

Somewhere between 300 and 600 gallons of oil has leaked into the Snake River from a turbine system at eastern Washington’s Little Goose Dam, according to the Army Corps of Engineers.

Based in Houston, Next Renewables wants to build the largest renewable diesel refinery on the West Coast at Port Westward, an industrial park owned by the Port of Columbia County near Clatskanie, about 60 miles northwest of Portland.

An international coalition of researchers says in a report published this week that the Earth’s vital signs have worsened to the point that “humanity is unequivocally facing a climate emergency.”

The rule changes are a result of the mediated and groundbreaking Private Forest Accord that brought together representatives from conservation groups and the timber industry.  The changes will impact timber harvest activities on more than 10 million acres of private and non-federal forests in the state.

The Sprague River Cattle Co. has filed a lawsuit arguing that its water rights would normally be worth $1.5 million but the “value has been entirely destroyed” by flow restrictions that render them “no longer marketable.”

This year La Niña returns for the third consecutive winter, and starting in December 2022 through February 2023, NOAA predicts drier-than-average conditions across the South with wetter-than-average conditions for areas of the Ohio Valley, Great Lakes, northern Rockies and Pacific Northwest.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife is asking for public feedback to inform the development of proposed fish passage and screening rules intended to support salmon and orca recovery.