Tracking public fund investments in fossil fuel projects.
September 17, 2014
Communities across Oregon and Washington are growing increasingly agitated about the risks of fossil fuel export. Proposed coal terminals generated unprecedented opposition from local residents and, more recently, dramatic increases in oil train traffic have many questioning the grave safety risks associated with a cargo so prone to explode. Yet at the very same time, the state governments of both Oregon and Washington are bankrolling coal, oil, and gas infrastructure.
In some cases, the subsidies and expenditures are known but relatively small. But in other cases, large quantities of public money fund the very same facilities so bitterly opposed by the taxpayers that the states are supposed to be investing for.
The governors of each state have voiced strong concern about—and even outright opposition to—major fossil fuel infrastructure projects. Yet, while Governors Inslee and Kitzhaber preach a sustainable future for our region, another wing of the executive branch is quietly betting public money on a vastly different vision.