LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD JANUARY 21 SHOW HERE:
The City of Nelson gave its Leaders in Sustainablility Award last December to the LV Rogers High School about the Green Team. We speak to students Jacqueline Willard and Anje Turner, teacher Tim Woolridge and principal Dan Rude.
Last week Premier David Eby and the BC government released the Mandate Letters for cabinet ministers and their departments. The Sierra Club of BC is raising concerns about the vagueness of environmental commitments. Jens Wieting from the Sierra Club of BC tells us about the holes in the BC government plans.
The West Kootenay CLimate Hub has been publishing a series of climate columns in local news papers and the latest one talks about affordability and climate. Climate Hub volunteer Tia Leschke from the Slocan Valley is part of the Climate Hub’s writing team and comes on to talk about affordability and climate.
COMING EVENTS:
3-6 pm Thursday January 23
Mir Centre for Peace in Castlegar
Choral Music: 40 Words for Yes
A surround-sound choral work composed by Nelson’s Doug Jamieson.
40 Words for Yes will be presented continuously from 3:00-6:00 pm. It’s a free event.
Also, there is a beautiful nature trail nearby which meanders through the woods and down along the mighty Columbia river to explore.
1:30 Sunday, January 26, 2025
Capitol Theatre
Science Pub featuring Suzanne Simard.
West Kootenay Watershed Collaborative presents Suzanne Simard for its 2nd Science Pub at the Capitol Theatre.
Dr. Simard, a professor of Forest Ecology at UBC and best-selling author, leads a team of researchers on the Mother Tree Project, which brings together academics, governments, First Nations and forestry companies to test forest renewal practices.
Price for WCWatershed Collaboraive memberws $18! Please visit Become A Member – West Kootenay Watershed Collaborative
Wednesday, February 12, 2025 | 7pm – 8pm
Mir Lecture: Carol Off
At a Loss for Words: Conversation in an Age of Rage
Castlegar, Brilliant Cultural Centre
Come and listen to beloved CBC broadcast journalist Carol Off on the importance of reclaiming the words that give life and meaning to our pursuit of a better world. Through stories from her 15 years of talking to people in 25,000 interviews, Off will share her insights into what happens when we lose our shared political vocabulary—and what it will take to reclaim it.
Adults: $35
Students, youth and low-barrier: $22
Nelson and Area Earth Week 2025
April 20-27
Community-wide events Planned
April 26th Taghum Hall Earth Day Festival
April 27th, Nelson Parade, route TBA.
As Earth Day 2025 approaches, the West Kootenay Climate Hub is inviting the community to celebrate the planet by hosting events.
If your organization has an idea or would like to create an event, reach out to us before January 31st. Contact: EarthWeekNelson@gmail.com
ENVIRONMENT NEWS BITS
Last November, Gitanyow Hereditary Chiefs marked the expiry of the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission (PRGT) pipeline’s provincial environmental certificate. In its place, they declared plans for an Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area (IPCA) at the site of ancestral villages and critical wild salmon runs at the confluence of the Cranberry, Nass, and Stikine rivers. The proposal is part of their opposition to the PRGT pipeline—a project designed to transport LNG from northeastern B.C. to the Nisga’a Nation co-owned Ksi Lisims floating terminal, which plans to export 12 million tonnes of LNG annually.
The proposed 800-kilometre pipeline route now overlaps with the planned IPCA. Gitanyow chiefs argue it poses significant risks to their salmon-dependent culture and livelihood, and that its outdated environmental certificate no longer makes sense in an accelerating climate crisis.
A First Nation in northern Alberta is telling the provincial government to “cease and desist” with plans for a C$70 billion artificial intelligence data centre proposed by celebrity investor Kevin O’Leary on its traditional territory.
On January 13, Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation wrote [pdf] an open letter to Premier Danielle Smith, stating it first learned about the proposed project—described by O’Leary Ventures as “the largest AI data centre industrial park in the world”—through [pdf] a press release.
“Our people are here to remind Mr. O’Leary and Greenview of the international treaty, Treaty No. 8, that allows us all to share this land,” said Sunshine. “There is protocol. There are legal requirements. They are not being followed.”
From the ‘going the wrong way on climate department’.
Wildfires and fossil fuel burning in 2024 contributed to the biggest annual rise in atmospheric CO2 levels ever recorded at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii
The level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere measured by a weather station at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii increased by 3.58 parts per million in 2024 – the biggest jump since records began there in 1958.
The record increase is partly due to CO2 emissions from fossil fuel burning and other human actions, such as cutting down forests, hitting a record high in 2024. Adding to this were a large number of wildfires, fuelled by record-smashing global temperatures boosted by the El Niño weather pattern on top of the long-term warming.
Eight years ago, the City of Chicago vowed to eventually run all its operations on carbon-free power. Now, it has fulfilled that promise, thanks to the largest U.S. solar farm east of the Mississippi River—and a temporary reliance on renewable energy credits.
The city’s 400+ buildings consume nearly 800,000 megawatt-hours of electricity each year, and, “as of January 1, every single one of them—including 98 fire stations, two international airports, and two of the largest water treatment plants on the planet”—is running on renewables, reports Grist.
The “significant pressures” on British Columbia’s forest industry have prompted a review of BC Timber Sales, the organization that manages about 20 per cent of the annual allowable cut.
Forests Minister Ravi Parmar says in a statement that the review will ensure the sector can continue to evolve to overcome challenges and create a more resilient industry in the future.
Parmar says he has asked Lennard Joe, CEO of the First Nations Forestry Council; George Abbott, a former B.C. government cabinet minister; and Brian Frenkel, a councillor with the District of Vanderhoof, to lead the review.
The statement says taking the action recognizes the pressures the forest sector is under from declining allowable annual cuts, difficulty accessing fibre, global economic conditions and heightened environmental and trade protections.
Premier David Eby announced last week that the province plans to amend legislation in order to place the North Coast Transmission Line entirely under the authority of the BC Energy Regulator, allowing the project to avoid an environmental assessment.
The North Coast Transmission Line is slated to run about 450 kilometres between Prince George and Terrace. It would deliver increased electrical capacity to B.C.’s northwest, in order to expand industries like mining and LNG production.
In its statement, the province described the BC Energy Regulator, which is funded by industry, as “a one-window regulator” and said that the planned legislative amendments will ] expedite the permitting, approval and construction of the power line.
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Eby’s announcement, made at the BC Natural Resources Forum in Prince George, comes after a year of heavy lobbying by the LNG industry.
https://thetyee.ca/News/2025/01/16/BC-Simplifies-Power-Project-Approval/
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