Stopping Tesoro

I want to commend Gov. Inslee for recently putting the kibosh on the Tesoro oil terminal proposed for the Washington coast, following the unanimous recommendation of the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council.

Small picture, this project might have provided some local jobs over the medium term. Big picture, this terminal would have oiled the skids on glutting the market with a resource we should conserve or leave in the ground, inadvisedly facilitated dumping tens of millions of tons of carbon into our atmosphere, and left increasingly vulnerable hundreds of communities like mine to dangerous derailments like that in Mosier, Oregon and elsewhere. I live in Idaho, and our little town would have received only direct risks and no direct benefits from this terminal.

As a region, let’s celebrate that more circumspect heads prevailed on this issue, hoping that we can move into a cleaner and more responsible energy future and avoid wallowing in the tarpit of our past.

John O’Connor

Bonners Ferry