PHOTO: GARY DIERS, http://www.WILLETWILDERNESSFOREVER.CA
LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD MARCH 18 EPISODE HERE:
Last summer Argenta was menaced by a large wildfire north and east of the community. The fire burned a wide swath across the slopes of Mount Willet. Now logging companies are competing to get access to do what they call ‘salvage logging’ of the burn. Argenta resident Gary Diers tells us how the need to protect the whole slope above the Northeast corner of Kootenay Lake is now more urgent than ever. And about how he encountered a white grizzly.
Donald Trump has suspended the talks that had nearly concluded on a renewed Columbia River Treaty. A few days ago B.C. Energy Minister Adrian Dix held a Victoria news conference on how the province would respond to another wildcard move from the US President. TheNarwhal.ca journalist Shannon Water was there and tells us what’s at stake and what the province is saying.
Another stunning forest film from the Valhalla Wilderness Society portrays a hidden Kootenay temperate rainforest. Save Haven The Rainbow Jordan Wilderness is being shown around the province and in our area. Amber Peters from Valhalla Wilderness tells us a bit about the making of the film.
LINKS MENTIONED ON THE SHOW:
Support the campaign to protect the mountainside over Kootenay Lake:
https://www.willetwildernessforever.ca/
You can also support the campaign on Facebook, search for Willet Wilderness.
BC reacts to Trump suspending Columbia River Treaty deal. Shannon Waters piece on TheNarwhal.ca
Details about Valhalla Wilderness Society’s campaign to protect Kootenay lands and the Safe Haven film
ENVIRONMENT EVENTS COMING UP:
Saturday, March 22nd 6 pm in Nelson
Earth Hour 2025
Turning off everything electrical for the hour.
The annual do-it-yourself at home, world wide Event Earth Hour is coming up this Saturday, March 22. Here Nelson Hydro customers are invited to join from 6 to 7 pm and turn off all lights and electrical appliances for one hour. Join the world-wide celebration of one hour of low power, low tech. Nelson Hydro is challenging us. If power use drops:
💡 10% → 3 winners will receive a $100 credit on their next hydro bill.
⚡ 25% → 10 winners will receive a $100 credit on their next hydro bill.
You can enter to participate on Nelson Hydro’s Facebook Page.
That’s Earth Hour, here in Nelson from 6 to 7 pm Saturday, March 22.
Wednesday, March 26 6:30 pm
Zoom event, please register
Resilience Cafe#2 from West Kootenay Climate Hub
Soil Health contributes to local resilience
An interactive webinar “café”, diving deep into the infinitely complex and fascinating world right beneath our feet.
Our guest experts, Greg Utzig and Kelpie Wilson, will share their insights and experiences, guiding us through methods of nurturing soil health and promoting carbon sequestration in our own backyards and communities.
RSVP at: https://www.westkootenayclimatehub.ca/event-details/resilience-cafe-2-fromthegroundup
Sustainable Development: Speaker Series
Friday, March 28, 2025, 5:00 pm
The Pit, Selkirk College, 301 Frank Beinder Way, Castlegar
For Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Month 2025, Sustainable Selkirk is hosting a student speaker series called Students for Sustainable Development across four campuses, highlighting talks from current or past Selkirk College students that address one or more of the SDGs.
Open to anyone in the community, attendance is by donation to support the Giving Days sustainability cause of developing applied learning projects on-campus that enhance and protect biodiversity.
Details at: https://selkirk.ca/events/students-sustainable-development?date=mar-14-2025
Saturday Saturday March 29th
Silverton Memorial Hall.
Public showing of Valhalla Wilderness Society’s latest film Safe Haven The Rainbow Jordan Wilderness.
details on VWS.org
https://www.vws.org/safe-haven-film/
Thursday, April 3, 2025
Time: 3:30 PM PT
Register for online event.
in Seniors for Climate for a special viewing of the new documentary, Later is Too Late, which captures the energy and impact of our first-ever National Seniors’ Day of Climate Action on October 1, 2024. On that day, seniors, youth, Indigenous elders, and climate activists rallied in 76 communities across Canada—from Nelson, BC to Pugwash, NS, to to Yellowknife, NT—to demand urgent climate action.
Register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_9TmL2ytwR9Se5AwKfl_L5Q
Earth Day and Earth Week 2025.
Earth Day April 22
Earth Week April 20-27
Nelson West Kootenay Events
As Earth Day 2025 approaches, the West Kootenay Climate Hub is inviting the community to celebrate the planet by hosting events.
Community-wide events planned so far:
Saturday, April 26th Taghum Hall Earth Day Festival
Sunday, April 27th, Nelson Parade, route TBA.
More info contact EarthWeekNelson@gmail.com
ENVIRONMENT NEWS BITS
Barry Saxifrage in The National Observer says Canada’s managed forest is one of the largest living reservoirs of carbon on the planet.
But. he writes, in the last couple of decades, the flow of CO2 has completely reversed. Chainsaws and fossil fuel pollution are cranking open the floodgates that hold back this enormous reservoir of forest carbon.
Canadian government numbers breaks these total emissions down into two parts: harvested wood and forest land total emissions. Total emissions was from 1990 to 2022 from forestry as 4,600 MtCO2. But over the same time, according to gov’t numbers, only 1,300 megatonnes of C02 were absorbed by forest. The net result is that Canada’s forest sector is a huge climate polluter.
Climate crisis continues as tornadoes killed at least 32 people across several states in the U.S. Midwest and Southeast last Saturday night, part of a monster storm strong enough to topple tractor-trailers and wipe out hundreds of buildings.
Twenty-six tornadoes were reported but not confirmed to have touched down late on Friday night and into Saturday. A low-pressure system drove powerful thunderstorms across parts of Arkansas, Illinois, Mississippi and Missouri, said David Roth, a meteorologist at the U.S. National Weather Service.
Most new media reports did NOT mention this extreme weather as a result of the climate crisis.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/us-south-wildfires-tornadoes-1.7484723
In a barrage of pronouncements last week the Trump administration said it would repeal dozens of the nation’s most significant environmental regulations, including limits on pollution from tailpipes and smokestacks, protections for wetlands, and the legal basis that allows it to regulate the greenhouse gases that are heating the planet.
But beyond that, Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, reframed the purpose of the E.P.A. In a two-minute-and-18-second video posted to X, Mr. Zeldin boasted about the changes and said his agency’s mission is to “lower the cost of buying a car, heating a home and running a business.”
New York Times ’ https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/12/climate/epa-zeldin-rollbacks-pollution.html?unlocked_article_code=1.3k4.VktV.VvpyAKZB0Tfe&smid=nytcore-android-share
Pilot projects across the United States are exploring how electric vehicles could help power grids adjust to rising demand.
State and local governments, schools, utilities, and companies are showing widespread interest in bidirectional charging technology, underlining its development from being cast as a “wild idea” to a critical tool for addressing power demand and climate change, writes Microgrid Knowledge.
The technology transforms EVs from being power consumers to power sources, enabling their batteries to feed electricity back to the grid during times of high demand. They act as a decentralized energy storage system without the added infrastructure of a conventional battery energy storage system project (BESS).
Longest running Enviro News show on the Radio! 