Barbara Bernstein

This November Portland voters have the historic opportunity to elect a new city council that actually reflects the diversity of its constituents. In 2022 voters overwhelmingly supported a city charter change that transforms the structure of the city government, dividing the... Read more

The last 10 miles of the Willamette River have been designated as a Superfund Site, a federal designation for the worst contaminated areas in the United States. The North Reach of the Willamette is one of the most complex Superfund Sites in the country. This highly contamin... Read more

Before Hamas’s horrific attack on Israel on October 7 we were mainly aware of two existential threats: the impending death of democracy and climate catastrophe. But that attack and Israel’s unrelenting response has split our attention and overwhelmed us with a barrage of is... Read more

Lawmakers and advocates have called upon Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum to launch an investigation into NW Natural for misleading consumers about the health impacts from gas. In their letter to Rosenblum they detail how NW Natural has taken a leaf from the tobacco ... Read more

Woody biomass has become the fossil-fuel industry’s renewable, green savior but this source of energy is fraught with problems. British energy giant Drax has proposed building a wood biomass processing and export facility in Longview, Washington, that would use one million ... Read more

  This program aired originally on September 4, 2023 Without the Salmon there would be no Pacific Northwest as we know it. Yet since 1991, most of the salmon runs in the Northwest have been listed as threatened or endangered. In 2005, I produced a documentary called Salmo... Read more

This past September the World Forestry Center sponsored an annual conference called “Who Will Own the Forests,” attended by the most notorious representatives in the Wall Street timber industry. There they schemed on perfecting the financialization of forest ecosystems, exp... Read more

It’s been a wild year in many respects and this week is the time of year when we reconnect with Eric de Place with Salish Strategies in Seattle, to puzzle out all that’s happened. Today we talk about the positives – of which there have actually been a few – as well as the m... Read more

For the past year a coalition of climate and social justice activists have been presenting a series of monthly Rumble On The River community forums that bring together expert voices to explain the risks of having 90% of Oregon’s fuel stored within city limits at the Critica... Read more

We still have a brief window of opportunity to avoid the worst impacts of climate change if we drastically and quickly begin to cut all carbon emissions. However meaningful efforts to achieve these cuts are being undermined by the heavy use of carbon offsets, which allow bu... Read more