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The Beaver Effect

By Rivers No Comments

Close your eyes and imagine you are sitting next to a stream. What do you see? What do you hear? You may be imagining noises associated with a babbling brook with water quickly moving down-gradient. Perhaps you see a bright green strip of vegetation next to the stream that transitions to sagebrush and pine as the ground rises away from the streambed. Do you see wildlife? Do you see beavers?

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Energy Choices Come into Focus

By Coal, Durango Herald Column, Energy Transition, Oil & Gas No Comments

Whitewater boating season offers a metaphor for our local energy supply. We’re in the calm pool edging closer and closer to the lip of the rapid, before plunging into frothy waves below. That’s the position La Plata Electric Association finds itself in, for years waiting to learn the cost to terminate its onerous electric supply contract with Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association. But this summer, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is expected to finally decide the formula for calculating the payment to exit the contract.

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