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KBOO Radio

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KBOO Radio is a community-powered station in Portland Oregon

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Navigating the Maze of the 2023 Oregon Legislative Session

This year’s Oregon legislative session has been another wild ride. There were more bills introduced this session than ever before—an interesting mix of vital bills addressing environmental, social and racial justice issues, and a rash of other bills to undo all that. While ...

Fossil Fuel Risk Bonds

The construction and operation of fossil fuel infrastructure is causing expensive physical and economic damages to land, air, water and frontline communities on an almost daily basis. But if, for example, a major earthquake destroys the tank farms comprising Portland’s Crit...

Goldendale Energy Storage Project

Boston-based Rye Development wants to build the largest pumped-storage hydroelectric development in the Pacific Northwest and in the process destroy irreplaceable Tribal Cultural and Religious Resources. Pumped storage is touted as the most efficient way to store solar and ...

Pushing for Environmentally Friendly Buildings

Transportation is the highest source of greenhouse gas emissions but emissions caused by residential and commercial buildings, including from electricity and natural gas use, are close behind. In 2021, while transportation was responsible for 35% of Oregon's carbon emission...

Certified Disaster

The oil & gas industry is turning to unproven and unregulated “gas certifiers” like Project Canary that claim to “measure” emissions and label their methane gas as “responsibly sourced”. The certified gas industry allows companies to charge a premium for their products, an...

Portland's Green Reckoning

Portland prides itself on its green reputation, but it's becoming more and more apparent that we are facing a number of environmental contradictions and challenges that belie this reputation. According to Bob Sallinger, Urban Conservation Director for Willamette Riverkeeper...

Once A Braided River

For thousands of years the north reach of the Willamette River, near its confluence with the Columbia, was a braided river of shallow channels and islands rich in biodiversity. That was until European settlers came to the Pacific Northwest and displaced the Indigenous pe...

Portland's Fukushima

This program aired originally on March 13, 2023 Last month marked the 12th anniversary of the 2011 Sendai earthquake and tsunami. The tsunami caused the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. There were meltdowns of three of the Fukushima reactors, discharge of radioact...

The Biogas Boondoggle

Our planet continues to be saturated with toxic byproducts of the fossil fuel industry and corporate agriculture. And now these two industrial sectors are combining forces to appeal to a growing public demand for meaningful climate action. As the movements to decarbonize an...

Eugene vs. NW Natural

On February 7, the Eugene City Council voted to phase out fossil fuels like gas in new homes and buildings, the first city in Oregon to take this step that will cut climate pollution, improve air quality, and lower utility bills for households. This vote is a major victory ...

A Forest Journey

In his 1989 book A Forest Journey, John Perlin shows how an abundance (or scarcity) of wood has greatly shaped the culture, demographics, economy, politics, and technology of societies over the millennia. Until our dependence on fossil fuels, wood was the principal fuel and...

How Green Is Portland These Days?

For the past few decades Portland has been internationally touted as a green city. In many ways it has deserved this reputation but there are still many ways in which the city needs to improve. In 2016 the city council approved a ban on any new or expanded fossil fuel infra...

Portland's Fukushima

This week marks the 12th anniversary of the 2011 Sendai earthquake and tsunami. The tsunami caused the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. There were meltdowns of three of the Fukushima reactors, discharge of radioactive water in Fukushima and associated evacuation zone...

Beavers and Biden

On February 27 a large coalition of nonprofit organizations, scientists, and advocates sent a letter to President Biden requesting an executive order prohibiting beaver from being trapped on federally managed public lands. According to Adam Bronstein with Western Watershed ...

Fracked Gas Industry Takes a Page from the Tobacco Industry

Recently the city of Eugene passed an ordinance to phase out gas appliances in new homes and buildings. This action follows similar ordinaces in cities around the country. But the fracked gas industry is not taking these moves lying down. Last November, NW Natural hired Dr....

Nightmare on the River

When you drive along Highway 30 through the industrial area of NW Portland, you witness an amazing contradiction. On the west side of the highway is Forest Park, Portland's premiere urban wilderness area. But on the east of the highway you see potential doom. That six mile ...

Just Transition or False Solutions?

As the climate crisis continues to intensify, accelerating the threats to communities across the planet, it is critical now more than ever to find solutions that come from impacted communities and not the fossil fuel industry. On this episode of Locus Focus, we talk with ...

The River That Runs Through Portland

After 30 years of amazing service Bob Sallinger is retiring from Portland Audubon. Bob's record as an advocate, activist, naturalist, wildlife researcher, and wildlife rehabber, and his deep ties to the community, have led to many of the most exciting conservation wins in P...

Roadways for People

When the I5 freeway rammed its way through North and Northeast Portland in the 1960s it devastated once thriving historically black neighborhoods, demolishing over 300 homes, destroying locally owned businesses and displacing hundreds of people. For most of the last century...

Does Portland Need More Industrial Land?

This program aired originally on 7/11/2022 Portland and other Oregon municipalities are required to inventory their employment land periodically as part of the comprehensive planning process. For decades the city has decided during each inventory process that it needs ...

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