Tag: Wildfire

Another wildfire burning in Colorado’s high country has raised the alarm over how crispy and dry the recent fall weather has been, and rekindled...

So who spends more when they’re out recreating in the woods, Carhartt-clad “sled-necks” or Lycra-encased cross-country skiers? According to one study being used to back...

Sen. Mark Udall promised to keep battling for beetle kill funding Friday after his bid for $50 million in emergency funds for the Forest...

Badly needed snowfall is expected in Colorado’s high country this week, but one expert says the state will need much more than the amount...

Tuesday’s announcement by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack that the U.S. Forest Service is pumping $40 million more into coping with the ongoing pine bark...

Backers of biofuel and biopower see the millions of lodgepole pine trees killed by the Rocky Mountain bark beetle epidemic as a source of carbon-neutral power. Their efforts to turn the devastation into usable energy may take off if Congress passes a bill floated by Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Udall late last week.

VAIL — A small but scary wildfire that broke out in the national forest above West Vail Friday afternoon perfectly underscored the ongoing debate between the state’s Department of Natural Resources and environmentalists over Colorado’s controversial roadless rule.

Two state lawmakers from mountain districts are working Capitol Hill the next couple of days in a bid to get the federal government to find some funds to fight the growing mountain pine beetle infestation that has laid waste to more than 2 million acres of Colorado forest. State Rep. Christin Scanlan, D-Dillon, and state Sen. Dan Gibbs, D-Silverthorne, whose districts have been ravaged by the rice-sized bugs, testified before the House Subcommittee on National Parks, Forest and Public Lands Tuesday that resulting wildfires could knock out the nation’s electrical grid and spoil water supplies for millions of downstream consumers in other states.

Picture a scenario sometime after 2010 where -- if Gov. Bill Ritter is reelected and the Dems keep control of the statehouse -- we’ll all be driving plug-in hybrids that run on a mix of ethanol and ground-up bark beetles, with tiny snowboarders emblazoned on our license plates. It’s a nightmare vision for most right-wingers, straight out of the Shangri-La they sneeringly refer to as the “People’s Republic of Boulder,” but it’s a little closer to reality today after Governor Renewable signed House Bill 1331, which provides state tax incentives for high-tech, fuel-efficient vehicles.

Gov. Bill Ritter is hitting the slopes at Arapahoe Basin today to sign some ski-related bills — not to indulge in the two inches of new snow that fell overnight at the state’s remaining ski area still open for business. If Ritter gets the same kind of reception he got Tuesday during a bill-signing ceremony at the Capitol, he’ll likely get a snowball in his ear at A-Basin, which closes for the season Sunday.