Idaho Energy Update from Snake River Alliance

By Alicia Healey | July 15, 2013

Idaho Power’s request to the Public Utilities Commission for approval of nearly $130 million in coal plant improvements is beginning to attract attention, and the public will have a chance to weigh in later this summer. Meanwhile, it turns out that Alternate Energy Holdings, the nomadic nuclear power plant developer, picked a Payette County reactor site that also happens to be home to a plant species the federal government says needs protection from activities such as nuclear power plants…

Read More

Idaho energy updates from Coalition member Snake River Alliance

By Alicia Healey | April 18, 2013

Idaho Power received a surprise earlier this month when its majority partner in its Nevada coal plants announced plans to get out of the coal generation business, customers just received the bad news from Idaho Power that their rates will rise this summer due in part to poor river flows and power generation and more news inside…

Read More

Idaho Statesman: Energy-efficiency success stories

By Alicia Healey | October 25, 2012

J.R. Simplot Co. has embraced energy efficiency as a core business value. The Idaho food, fertilizer and chemical company has dramatically reduced its use of electricity and natural gas, saving millions of dollars annually.

The company says energy-efficiency improvements since 2009 have yielded natural gas savings of 1.3 trillion British thermal units and 390,821,028 kilowatt-hours of electricity. The electricity reduction is equivalent to taking 35,400 homes off the grid. The reduction also saved 95,056 tons of greenhouse-gas emissions, like taking 29,929 cars of the road.

Here are three other successes…Read more at the Idaho Statesman

Read More

ID Energy Update: A Win for Wind, A Loss for Efficiency

By Alicia Healey | October 8, 2012

Read this and previous reports on Snake River Alliance’s website.   Idaho Energy Update October 4, 2012   The Snake River Alliance has a new home in Boise! The Alliance recently relocated from our former digs at 9th & Jefferson in downtown Boise to 6th & Idaho. We’ll have an office warming celebration from 5:30-7:30…

Read More

Alliance Reports on Idaho Utilities’ Use of Coal-Fired Generation

By Alicia Healey | October 4, 2011

The Snake River Alliance has released the first of two reports on the use of coal-fired generation by Idaho’s three electric utilities.

The report, “Idaho’s Dangerous Dalliance with King Coal,” notes that the utilities own or have a stake in no fewer than 29 out-of-state coal plants, the bulk of which are owned or partly owned by PacifiCorp, which does business in eastern Idaho as Rocky Mountain Power.

Read More

Columbia River salmon plans: The judge is not amused

By Alicia Healey | August 4, 2011

The Seattle Times Editorial page weighs in on Judge Redden’s ruling. U.S. District Court Judge James Redden issued a 24-page ruling Tuesday that slapped down another federal plan for operating the economic interests of the Columbia and Snake rivers, while working to save endangered fish.

Read More

Federal Judge Rules for Columbia and Snake River Salmon

By Alicia Healey | August 3, 2011

U.S. District Court Judge James Redden ruled today that the NOAA Fisheries Service again failed to produce a legal and scientific plan to protect imperiled Columbia-Snake River salmon from harm caused by the operation of federal dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers. Today’s court action – which has been ongoing for almost a decade – is a landmark decision for fishing and conservation groups, the state of Oregon and the Nez Perce and Spokane tribes, all of which have opposed the federal biological opinion, or BiOp, in court.

Read More