wednesday, August 5, 2015

Volume 40 | Number 72

s u n

4 injured in crash
on state Highway 75

v a l l e y

k e t c h u m

h a i l e y

One copy free | All others 50

b e l l e v u e

c a r e y

IDAHO MOUNTAIN

Gallery Walk

Tour galleries, sip wine in Ketchum

Arts & Events, Page 1

Page 4

Valley solar project

faces new hurdle

Page 7

Blaine County Fair

kicks into high gear

ANDGUIDE

Page 10

Senate passes
wilderness bill
President expected to sign legislation
to protect Boulder-White Clouds

I
Express photo by Willy Cook

A Little Sweet, A Little Swamp

Honey Island Swamp Band lead guitarist Chris Mul, left, acoustic guitarist Aaron Wilkinson, middle, and bassist Sam Price play to a
happy crowd Friday night during the 38th edition of the Northern Rockies Music Festival at Hop Porter Park in Hailey. The band played
a blend of Cajun-spiced blues influenced and spiked with Southern rock n roll. The group formed in San Francisco after being evacuated from New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. They knew each other from New Orleans and got together after a chance
encounter at bluesman John Lee Hookers Boom Boom Room on Fillmore Street. For more photos of the festival, turn to Page 24.

By GREG MOORE
Express Staff Writer

daho conservationists are celebrating passage of a BoulderWhite Clouds wilderness bill by

the Senate on Tuesday morning.
Before adjourning for its summer
recess, the Senate passed without
opposition the Sawtooth National
Recreation Area and Jerry Peak Wilderness Additions Act. The House
passed an identical bill on July 27,
and bill proponents say they expect
President Barack Obama to sign it.
The Senate vote came quickly after
the bill was passed Thursday, July
30, by the Senate Energy and Natural
Resources Committee.
Craig Gehrke
The Wilderness Society
The bill, which creates three new
wilderness areas totaling 275,665
acres, was drafted by Rep. Mike Simpson, R-Idaho, and introduced in the Senate by Sen. Jim Risch, also R-Idaho. It
is the final product of a more than decade-long effort on

Today,
Idahoanscan
celebrate that
the future
of the wild
Boulder-White
Clouds area is
secure.

See Wilderness, Page 12

Idaho weighs response to climate plan

Several states likely to sue EPA over carbon rule
By PETER JENSEN
Express Staff Writer

With the unveiling of President Barack

Obamas plan to cut U.S. power plants carbon emissions on a state-by-state basis 32
percent over the next 15 years, the debate
now shifts to the state level over whether
to implement or fight the regulations.
Several states seem certain to sue to
block implementation of the rule, arguing that the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency doesnt have the legal authority to
do so and that the regulations would roil
energy markets.
Obama rolled out his Clean Power Plan
Monday. It is the most aggressive action
his administration has yet taken in reducing carbon emissions, which he considers
a root cause of global climate change.
The plan targets existing power plants,
mostly dealing with coal-fired energy production, and sets reductions in carbon
emissions that states will have to reach by
2030.
States are given until 2016 to submit
their final plans or an initial plan with a
request for an extension, which would

give them until 2018 to finalize their plans.

Those that fail to meet the deadline would
have a plan imposed by the EPA.
By Tuesday morning, a coalition of 13
Republican-held states had announced
they were going to fight the rule in court.
That could upend the regulations, but
with the 2018 timeline, the plans fate may
reside on which political party controls
the White House following the presidential
election next year.

State mulls response

Idaho seems more likely to stay on the
sidelines as that legal fight unfolds.
Attorney General Lawrence Wasden
isnt planning to join the other states,
spokesman Todd Dvorak said Tuesday
morning.
At this point, the attorney general
doesnt have any plans to join any of the
AGs who are gearing up over a fight,
Dvorak said. Well be watching to see how
things develop.
Gov. Butch Otter submitted comments
to the EPA last fall while the rule was still
in draft form, requesting an exemption
and asserting that EPA didnt have the le-

one-size-fits-all approach
gal authority to implehanded down from inment it.
side the beltway.
Otter is still evaluatDemocrats and enviing his options, Press
ronmental groups herSecretary Jon Hanian
alded the plan, however,
wrote in a statement.
calling it meaningful
We are very conand long-overdue accerned about this decition on reducing carbon
sion, Hanian wrote.
emissions
nationally.
The Governor believes
Ken Miller
Obama said in remarks
EPA lacks legal standSnake River Alliance
Monday that it was the
ing and the rule-making
single most important
authority to promulstep America has ever
gate these arbitrary
made in the fight against global warming.
standards.
Further, Otter criticized the plans apRelatively small burden
proach in targeting emissions from the
energy sector. While the sector is responsi- Idahos burden under the rule is scant,
ble for 31 percent of nations carbon emis- relative to heavily coal-reliant states like
sionsthe largest single sourceHanian Wyoming or West Virginia. Idaho has no
wrote that the plan will just make energy coal plants within its borders, but it imports about half of its electricity, includmore expensive.
It singles out the domestic power gen- ing an abundance of coal-fired power, from
erating industry while doing nothing to outside state lines.
address other factors that contribute to Idahos 2030 target is only a 10 percent
greenhouse gas emissions, like the tons reduction in pounds of carbon dioxide per
of CO2 generated by wildfires, Hanian megawatt hour of electricity. Of states inwrote. The Governor disagrees with this
See energy, Page 6

Its actually not as

big a challenge as it is
for many other states.
[Idahos] not that far
away from compliance.