\n<\/p>\n
This article was produced for ProPublica\u2019s Local Reporting Network in partnership with Oregon Public Broadcasting. Sign up for Dispatches to get our stories in your inbox every week.<\/p>\n
\n These highlights were written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story. \n <\/p>\n During the outcry against nuclear power in the 1970s, liberal Oregon lawmakers hatched a plan to slow an industry that was just getting started. They created a burdensome process that gave the public increased say over where power plants could be built, and the leading anti-nuclear activists of the day used appeal after appeal to delay proposed nuclear plants to death. It had a huge impact: Oregon\u2019s first commercial nuclear plant, the one that spurred lawmakers into action, was also the state\u2019s last.<\/p>\n What those lawmakers didn\u2019t plan for was that 50 years later, an Oregon citizen activist would use that same bureaucracy to hinder some of the very energy projects that today\u2019s liberals want: wind farms and the new high-voltage lines needed to support them.<\/p>\n They didn\u2019t plan for Irene Gilbert.<\/p>\n The 76-year-old retired state employee, former gun store owner and avid elk hunter from La Grande, Oregon, is on a mission to keep turbines and transmission towers from blighting the rural landscape. She has filed more challenges to energy projects \u2014 15 in all, including lawsuits \u2014 than anyone in the state, according to Oregon\u2019s Department of Energy.<\/p>\n \u201cI kind of have a reputation,\u201d Gilbert said.<\/p>\n Renewable energy advocates treat activists like Gilbert as relentless gadflies who need to be stopped for the good of the planet.<\/p>\n They say Oregon\u2019s slow process for approving energy projects, with its endless appeals, is one reason the state ranks near last in the country for green energy growth despite setting a deadline to eliminate fossil fuel use by 2040.<\/p>\n Democratic leaders up and down the West Coast are reckoning with liberal policies of the past that they say clash with today\u2019s progressive agenda. In California, for example, Gov. Gavin Newsom recently signed a rollback of environmental review laws to expedite the construction of affordable housing. Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek has been pushing to roll back her state\u2019s vaunted land-use restrictions for the same reason.<\/p>\n But Oregon leaders have been far less aggressive in confronting the historical artifacts that critics say hold green energy back. One, the Depression-vintage federal agency that runs most of the Northwest power grid, which has set a sluggish pace for upgrades; the other, the energy siting system Oregon created long ago for nuclear power. (The federal agency says it makes financially prudent decisions about construction.)<\/p>\n In the past five years, the Oregon Legislature has repeatedly rejected or watered down bills to streamline permitting of energy projects. The efforts included legislation supported by renewables advocates as well as farming and land conservation groups, both of which share Gilbert\u2019s concerns about development in rural spaces.<\/p>\n In response to questions from Oregon Public Broadcasting and ProPublica, the governor\u2019s office acknowledged \u201cexisting significant impediments\u201d to renewable energy growth in Oregon.<\/p>\n Kotek is \u201ccarefully considering opportunities to streamline Oregon\u2019s energy siting processes,\u201d spokesperson Anca Matica said in an email, \u201cwhile maintaining opportunities for community input and preventing detrimental impacts.\u201d<\/p>\n In the meantime, Kotek and lawmakers let another effort to modernize the system fall through the cracks this year. A proposal to limit public appeals and speed up permitting decisions resulted in only minor changes to the process. The status quo means developers remain locked in battles with Gilbert and others for years on end.<\/p>\n \u201cI figure I can lose a thousand cases,\u201d Gilbert said. \u201cEven if it doesn\u2019t look like it, I have made a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n Gilbert was retired from a career in state government and was running the Oregon Trail Trader gun shop with her partner in La Grande when she first heard about the Antelope Ridge wind farm. It was 2009, and only a handful of wind farms existed in the state. But an energy company suddenly wanted to erect 180 turbines across the scenic Grande Ronde River valley just outside town.<\/p>\n Energy infrastructure was a sore spot for Gilbert. Decades ago, she\u2019d married into a ranching and timber family, and a chunk of the forest she owned was bulldozed for a transmission line. She blamed the line when she couldn\u2019t get the timber to grow as she wanted.<\/p>\n She also had a stark memory of how quickly a business can erase a beloved part of rural Oregon. The company that owned Kinzua, the timber town where she grew up, razed it without a trace after shutting down operations in 1978.<\/p>\n Now that she was older, she said, she wanted to give back, and she was motivated by the idea of helping farmers and others protect their land from the government and electric companies.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel like my reason for participating now is to do what I can to help these poor folks,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Gilbert became the legal research analyst for an opposition group known as Friends of the Grande Ronde Valley.<\/p>\n The tangle of rules governing energy siting was no problem. She\u2019d worked as a trainer for the Oregon Department of Human Services and later Oregon Occupational Safety and Health, where she taught people how to understand the statutes that guided their work.<\/p>\n \u201cSo I know how to read government regulations,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n She also enjoys it. <\/p>\n \u201cIt keeps my brain working,\u201d she said with a laugh.<\/p>\n Gilbert spoke against the wind farm at public hearings. During one meeting in which she tried to add to her previous comments, she was cut off because the time for public testimony had passed.<\/p>\n She argued against the wind farm before the Oregon Energy Facility Siting Council, which has ultimate authority over whether major pieces of infrastructure like wind farms, solar projects, power plants and transmission lines get built. She sent a letter to the governor\u2019s office stating she would sue and make all of the state\u2019s dealings with the energy company public along the way.<\/p>\n That wind farm never materialized. The company backed out in 2013, citing poor market conditions.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were successful in stopping that,\u201d she said. \u201cThe company would say that it was a financial decision. I think it was more than that.\u201d (The company told OPB and ProPublica in a statement that it was \u201cthe lack of strong commercial prospects.\u201d)<\/p>\n Proposals for new wind farms kept cropping up, and she contested as many as she could, even ones three hours from her home. She\u2019s missed only a handful of the energy siting council\u2019s monthly meetings in the past decade, driving all around the state before video conferencing became common. Developers have approached her after meetings, she said, and asked her what it would take to make her happy.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve been called \u2018an old lady who has access to a computer,\u2019\u201d she said. \u201cThat\u2019s kind of, I guess, how I\u2019m viewed, and OK \u2026 I guess that\u2019s OK.\u201d<\/p>\n She sometimes works at the antique desk in her home office, sometimes from the couch in a living room filled with her grandchildren\u2019s artwork. She\u2019s filed multiple challenges to five wind farms plus one big transmission line since the demise of Antelope Ridge. The transmission line is moving forward. Two of the wind projects were scuttled by developers, while three others got built.<\/p>\n Landowners and lawyers from around the region eventually began seeking her input for filing their own objections to energy projects.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd my advice is free,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n A committed Republican, Gilbert said she doesn\u2019t do all this because she opposes the idea of clean energy. She owns a cabin powered by rooftop solar panels. She said she doesn\u2019t believe in the need for large-scale solar, but said she did support a solar farm in the scenic Columbia River Gorge after developers listened to public input and took steps to reduce the project\u2019s impact.<\/p>\n But she finds herself quite often at odds with the work of major wind, solar and transmission players, \u201cJust because it\u2019s taking so much land.\u201d<\/p>\n Fuji Kreider, a self-described liberal Democrat who relocated from New York, started a friendship with Gilbert while both campaigned against a major transmission project.<\/p>\n \u201cShe calls herself a redneck environmentalist,\u201d Kreider said during a visit at Gilbert\u2019s home.<\/p>\n Kreider\u2019s husband, Jim, chimed in: \u201cA redneck, gun-toting environmentalist.\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cSomething like that,\u201d Kreider said.<\/p>\n In late summer 2023, Adam Richins, the chief operating officer of the electric utility Idaho Power, sat down in a black leather wingback chair at Paddy\u2019s Bar & Grill in downtown Portland to swap horror stories with other Northwest leaders in the industry on a niche podcast called the Public Power Underground.<\/p>\n One of Richins\u2019 doozies involved Irene Gilbert.<\/p>\n Richins at the time was in year 16 of trying to build a 300-mile transmission line through eastern Oregon, known as the Boardman to Hemingway line, or B2H for short. It is the crucible of Oregon\u2019s energy growth, the single piece of infrastructure that utilities and renewable advocates are most eager to see built. It would connect Idaho green energy suppliers with Oregon data centers that demand loads of electricity.<\/p>\n \u201cAnybody want to guess?\u201d Richins asked his fellow power execs at one point during the show. \u201cState process application. How many pages?\u201d <\/p>\n \u201c10,000,\u201d one offered.<\/p>\n He shook his head, raised his thumb upward. Higher. And higher still.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was close to 20,000 pages,\u201d Richins told them. <\/p>\n By the time the executive finished his tale of environmental reviews and land use certificates, he joked that he had tears running from his eyes.<\/p>\n \u201cBut then, guess what happens?\u201d Richins said. \u201cWe got sued.\u201d<\/p>\n By Gilbert.<\/p>\n Gilbert\u2019s fight against B2H has been her biggest yet. Slicing through 300 miles of land Gilbert desperately wants to keep undisturbed, the line illustrates the stakes she and other rural Oregonians see in ridding grasslands and forests of massive new energy projects.<\/p>\n One of Gilbert\u2019s \u201cStop B2H\u201d allies, John Williams, owns the last remaining swath of what was once a sprawling family ranch and timber estate, just a few minutes\u2019 drive from Gilbert\u2019s home. Bushwhacking through wildflowers along his property line on a recent day, Williams, Gilbert and the Kreiders looked out on Twin Lake, its surface carpeted in yellow pond lilies and dotted with nesting birds. The activists worry the line will harm birds and that construction and maintenance crews driving through the transmission line corridor will carry in noxious weeds and invasive species.<\/p>\n Williams said Idaho Power\u2019s proposed path, which runs through his property, has evolved over time \u2014 for the worse. \u201cIt\u2019s lipstick on a pig,\u201d he said, \u201cbut the original route I think made a lot less damage. It was lower in elevation. It took less timber.\u201d<\/p>\n Idaho Power spokesperson Sven Berg told OPB and ProPublica the company has altered the transmission line\u2019s path numerous times in response to public feedback and that the project is better for it.<\/p>\n John Williams points to a section of a map showing the planned route of the Boardman to Hemingway power transmission line. Williams, along with Gilbert and other Stop B2H allies, believe the project will ruin rural ecologies in Oregon.<\/span><\/p>\n About an hour west of Twin Lake the next day, Gilbert sat with Sam Myers, who runs a fourth-generation wheat farm that the B2H line would transect. Myers said he worries the high-voltage lines could spark wildfires or electrocute people operating farm machinery nearby. (Idaho Power says planting and harvesting crops near the B2H will still be safe but cautions farmers against using machinery taller than 15 feet underneath. The company says its equipment meets or exceeds industry standards, that this equipment is closely monitored, and that the tall, metallic structures used for lines like B2H pose less fire risk than with smaller ones.)<\/p>\n Myers said he\u2019s turned down developers offering \u201chuge amounts of money\u201d to put solar panels on his property. <\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t want to change farm ground to solar,\u201d he said he\u2019s told them. \u201cIs there a way we can have a coexistence?\u201d<\/p>\n Gilbert\u2019s Stop B2H coalition, with 1,000 members, raised more than $350,000 against the project. (Kreider, the group\u2019s treasurer, said the vast majority of donations \u2014 aside from larger checks from a few landowners and two historic preservation organizations \u2014 were less than $1,000 and came from individuals in Oregon and Eastern Idaho. She said the money went mainly to legal fees.)<\/p>\n B2H opponents filed a total of 117 challenges to the power line project, keeping the appeals process going long after the state approved construction in 2019.<\/p>\n In late March, though, the opponents lost their final appeal in court. Idaho Power began construction last month. <\/p>\n If Richins, the utility\u2019s COO, feels exasperated by the two decades it took to overcome complaints from Gilbert and others, Gilbert thinks mainly about the outcome for her side.<\/p>\n For all its delays, the state\u2019s energy council, in practice, does not reject proposed projects. And despite the claims that she\u2019s gumming up the state\u2019s process with her appeals, Gilbert has never actually reversed a council decision.<\/p>\n \u201cMy perception is that I\u2019m ignored,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n It might seem paradoxical that Gilbert considers herself an environmentalist while standing in the way of what most environmentalists today see as progress. But her right to do so has its roots in Oregon\u2019s storied conservation movement of the 1970s.<\/p>\n Portland General Electric, a leading utility, prompted a fierce public backlash when it announced construction in 1967 on the Trojan Nuclear Plant about an hour outside of Portland. To address concerns about the safety of nuclear power and radioactive waste, Oregon lawmakers created the Nuclear and Thermal Energy Council.<\/p>\n PGE would eventually shutter Trojan after decades of regulatory violations, forced shutdowns, construction flaws, costly repairs and constant harrying from antinuclear activist Lloyd Marbet through the state council. Marbet\u2019s tactics also delayed PGE\u2019s efforts to build two more plants on the Columbia River until voters passed a ballot measure in 1980, creating strict rules for nuclear power that effectively killed the industry in Oregon.<\/p>\n The council lived on, rebranded as the Energy Facility Siting Council to cover more than just nuclear power.<\/p>\n Oregon is one of only 10 states with statewide energy standards, and renewable energy developers consider its approval process one of the country\u2019s most rigorous. Covering everything from environmental safety and wildfire risk to sites of archaeological significance , Oregon\u2019s law requires developers to follow many of the same steps federal regulators require.<\/p>\n The process is supposed to take no more than a year. But the energy siting council will suspend the deadline anytime someone formally objects to a project\u2019s approval. A protest triggers a hearing, after which an administrative judge can ask the council to reverse itself, after which the council can agree or disagree, after which anyone can file a lawsuit, after which years of litigation may begin.<\/p>\n Oregon\u2019s assistant director for energy siting, Todd Cornett, said public involvement can slow projects down, but that\u2019s what the Legislature intended. While most of the power gets consumed on the more populous west side of the state that includes Portland, he noted, the new windmills and solar arrays are generally destined for dry, windy and rural eastern Oregon.<\/p>\n \u201cWe want to make sure that we\u2019re taking into consideration all of the issues and concerns that people who are going to have to live with these facilities raise in the process,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Cornett denies this process has held back renewables, noting that projects have stalled even after the council\u2019s approval. But he also acknowledged such holdups arise because new wind and solar farms will need more transmission lines to carry their output. There aren\u2019t enough, in part, because it\u2019s so difficult to get new ones through Cornett\u2019s agency.<\/p>\n Some Oregon progressives give a nod to the bureaucracy that once mired nuclear reactors and say it\u2019s time to give windmills and solar panels a faster pass.<\/p>\n \u201cThe process back in the early \u201970s was meant to be a little bit more plodding,\u201d said Oregon Rep. Ken Helm, a Democrat from the Portland suburbs, during a House floor speech in April. \u201cNow that we are many, many decades past that time, we\u2019re finding that the procedures EFSC operates under are really too slow for the relatively low-risk renewable energy that we\u2019re seeking.\u201d<\/p>\n The Boardman to Hemingway transmission line is projected to cut through Williams\u2019 property. Some Oregon progressives say it\u2019s time to give windmills, solar panels and transmission upgrades a faster pass to approval and construction.<\/span><\/p>\n Yet lawmakers have balked at meaningful changes.<\/p>\n Two years ago they rejected a bill to create committees of farmers, developers, tribes and conservationists to identify places in each county for transmission lines and energy production. The bill also would have directed state agencies to streamline the renewable energy approval process.<\/p>\n This year, lawmakers rejected a bill to promote solar farms that coexist with cropland. Research at Oregon State University has found that the shade from solar panels increased crop yields and that, in turn, the crops can make solar panels work more efficiently by keeping the air around them cool.<\/p>\n With Gilbert\u2019s long battle against B2H dragging on earlier this year, some lawmakers became galvanized. The 20 years it had taken to get the project on track was \u201cridiculous,\u201d said Rep. Mark Gamba, a Portland-area Democrat who is vice chair of the House Committee on Climate, Energy and Environment.<\/p>\n In February, Gamba introduced legislation to overhaul the state\u2019s approach to siting and permitting energy facilities. Among the proposed changes: a tight restriction on appeals from members of the public. The provision would require that any lawsuit challenging the state\u2019s approval of a project be fast-tracked to the state Supreme Court.<\/p>\n \u201cSo the NIMBYs will only get one bite at the apple,\u201d Gamba said, using the acronym for \u201cnot in my backyard\u201d that refers to people considered reflexively opposed to development near them.<\/p>\n The Legislature was coming after the gadflies like Gilbert.<\/p>\n When members of the Stop B2H coalition gather in Gilbert\u2019s living room, a computerized display of properties in the path of the project sits on a chair just beneath a portrait of a Native American man in a headdress of fur and bison horns. One of Gilbert\u2019s brothers made the canvas from the hide of an elk he shot, and another painted it.<\/p>\n Both brothers died of Hungtington\u2019s disease, a genetic disorder that began to severely debilitate them during their 30s. Gilbert, who had the same likelihood of inheriting the disease but did not, said losing them turned her into an overachiever who always wanted to fight for the underdog.<\/p>\n \u201cI think I kind of try to compensate for what they weren\u2019t able to do,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Fights against energy and transmission projects have been her mainstay for more than a decade. She said she sometimes awakens in the middle of the night, struck by an idea about a rule or statute that might be of use.<\/p>\n \u201cMost of the people in Stop B2H believe that we need more energy. And I agree, we need more energy. But we cannot provide the energy needs of this country or this state by taking all of the farmland,\u201d Gilbert said. \u201cThere\u2019s a point where we aren\u2019t going to have the land needed to produce food.\u201d<\/p>\n When Gilbert heard about Gamba\u2019s bill to upend her main means of objecting, she did not panic. She did what she has always done. She spoke up.<\/p>\n On a recent May afternoon in Salem, Gilbert sat on a window bench outside a Capitol hearing room where she\u2019d testified against Gamba\u2019s bill. <\/p>\n \u201cI remember you!\u201d exclaimed Gilbert\u2019s state representative, Republican Bobby Levy. \u201cYou\u2019re one of the smartest people. You do your research.\u201d<\/p>\n Levy said she was working to oppose the bill.<\/p>\n Gamba in the end was disappointed with what the Legislature was able to pass. After setting out to overhaul Oregon\u2019s energy siting bureaucracy, he said the scaled-back legislation only \u201cdabbled around the edges.\u201d It might shave 10% off approval times for green energy, he said.<\/p>\n What did survive was Gamba\u2019s effort to move lawsuits filed by people like Gilbert directly to the Oregon Supreme Court. Gilbert was dismayed to lose the chance to build a case over time. But it won\u2019t stop her.<\/p>\n \n Higher Prices, Rolling Blackouts: The Northwest Is Bracing for the Effects of a Lagging Green Energy Push<\/strong>\n <\/p>\n Now that the Boardman to Hemingway line is actually getting built, Gilbert said, it will bring a rash of new applications from people seeking to build wind and solar farms along the power line\u2019s route. Gilbert will be standing by to file challenges.<\/p>\n \u201cI figure I\u2019m going to be really busy,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Land where the Boardman to Hemingway transmission line is expected to be built<\/span><\/p>\n This article was produced for ProPublica\u2019s Local Reporting Network in partnership with Oregon Public Broadcasting. Sign up for Dispatches to get our stories in your inbox every week. Reporting Highlights \u201cNo\u201d to Nukes: Oregon liberals, opposed to nuclear power in the 1970s, created a complex process for getting new energy projects approved. New Energy Woes:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15699,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[611,728,9229,3905,247,7353,668],"class_list":{"0":"post-15698","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-social-issues","8":"tag-energy","9":"tag-green","10":"tag-oregon","11":"tag-projects","12":"tag-propublica","13":"tag-stalling","14":"tag-woman"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15698","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15698"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15698\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}An Old Lady With a Laptop<\/h3>\n
The Boardman to Hemingway Line<\/h3>\n
\n Credit: <\/span>
\n Steve Lenz for ProPublica
\n <\/span><\/p>\nOregon\u2019s Energy Law<\/h3>\n
\n Credit: <\/span>
\n Steve Lenz for ProPublica
\n <\/span><\/p>\nAn Overachiever for the Underdog<\/h3>\n
\n Credit: <\/span>
\n Steve Lenz for ProPublica
\n <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"