Chevron Overturned: What It Means for Our Environment – EcoNews Report #239

The U.S. Supreme Court building framed by tree branches.

 Chevron deference is no more. What’s Chevron deference you ask? Well, it was the backbone of our federal administrative state. Congress often passes laws that are vague or are capable of multiple interpretations. In Chevron, decided in 1984, the Supreme Court said that where a law is vague, the agency gets deference to its … Read more

Project 2025 and the Environment: EcoNews Report #238

Representative Jared Huffman standing beside a river. Eco News Report logo.

Special guest Rep. Jared Huffman is heading a task force in the Democratic caucus to address Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s policy outline for a second Trump administration. The document is pervaded by anti-science and anti-regulatory animus, with a particular focus on climate science and renewable energy. This week on the EcoNews Report, Friends of … Read more

Great Opportunities and Challenges for the Great Redwood Trail: EcoNews Report #234

A kayaker paddles in a murky river next to an abandoned rail car. Eco News Report Saturdays at 10 A.M. on K HUM 104 point 7 or on your podcast app.

 This week on the EcoNews Report, our host Alicia Hamann from Friends of the Eel River discusses the opportunities and challenges presented by the Great Redwood Trail. The project, proposed to be the longest rail-trail in the nation, is the state’s opportunity to fulfill their responsibility to remediate the environmental harms caused by the … Read more

Rep. Huffman Talks Legislative Priorities

Congressman Jared Huffman joins the show to discuss the current happenings in Washington D.C. — Who the heck is Speaker Mike Johnson? Will we pass a continuing budget resolution? Why would any thinking person want to be a United States Representative? — and his legislative priorities. From offshore wind to Eel River dams to nickel … Read more

Dangerous Dams in Our Backyard

On this week’s episode of the EcoNews Report we reflect on the tragic dam failure in Libya last month and discuss why Scott Dam on the Eel River poses similar risks. The PG&E owned dam sits right on a significant fault line, the Bartlett Spring Fault. Between its unusual engineering and a century’s worth of … Read more

Sonoma Proposal for Eel River Dams and Why Humboldt Should Be Wary

On this week’s episode of the EcoNews Report our host Tom Wheeler is joined by Alicia Hamann and Craig Tucker from Friends of the Eel River to discuss a vague, last-minute proposal from water users to take over part of the Potter Valley Project. Pacific Gas and Electric, owners of the two Eel River dams … Read more

Flow Enhancement Projects on the South Fork Eel

 How do you improve the flow of a river? Just ask our friends at Salmonid Restoration Federation. On this week’s episode of the EcoNews Report host Alicia Hamann of Friends of the Eel River is joined by Dana Stolzman and Katrina Nystrom from Salmonid Restoration Federation, and Joel Monschke from Stillwater Sciences, for a … Read more

What’s That Fence In the River?

 This week on the EcoNews Report hosts Alicia Hamann from Friends of the Eel River and Tom Wheeler from EPIC discuss an experimental installation in the South Fork of the Eel River. Guests Marisa McGrew from the Wiyot Tribe’s Natural Resources Department and Gabe Rossi and Philip Georgakakos, both research scientists with UC Berkeley, … Read more

Congressman Jared Huffman Returns to the Show to Spill All the DC Tea

We don’t know why he continues to join the show—doesn’t he realize he’s palling around with a bunch of treehugging dirt worshipers?—but Congressman Jared Huffman joins the EcoNews again for more discussion on what’s going on in Washington D.C. Who does he want to replace Feinstein? What’s it like to work with George Santos? How … Read more

Big Gov’t Isn’t Coming to Steal Your Gas Stove (But Maybe It Should)

For a weird, brief moment, prominent conservatives pitched a collective freak out over the false notion that the Biden Administration was coming to steal gas stoves. (“You can have my stove when you pry it from my cold, dead hands!”) While bad-faith scaremongering in the conservative culture war isn’t really newsworthy, the moment had something of … Read more