Winter Drought Has Potential Economic Impact
KXLY NEWS 4
A drought could have a devastating impact on the environment, as well as your every day life. Some local officials in the state are already mulling over restrictions on car washing and lawn watering.
Fish biologists say there could be 'localized extinction' of Cutthroat and Bull trout. And power costs for your home are almost certain to remain high.
Batteries, we commonly store electricity in them. But if you want to store a lot of power, you store is as water, in reservoirs behind dams. If there's lots of water there's lots of power. If there's drought, there's a dead battery.
Electricity is what powers several key segments of the Inland Northwest economy, most notably, aluminum production. According to a scenario prepared by the Governor's office, the cost of power to aluminum plants like Mead for the next two years could run more than 40 dollars a megawatt hour.
If the price of power is 35 to 40 bucks a megawatt, can this plant make money. From what they have told us, no. Wayne Bentz is one of about 700 laid off steelworkers wondering when he might be able to go back to work. If power prices stabilize above 40 dollars, it may be never. "If that ends up happening, we won't have a job."
Indeed, the Governor's projections say that aluminum, pulp and paper, and agriculture industries are going to be hit particularly hard by rising energy costs. The state could lose 43 thousand jobs.
But while the Wall Street Journal says Washington State may be headed toward recession, local economists don't think so. "Six months from now things will be looking a lot better even while growth remains slow." Spokane's Phil Kuharski expects the west side will absorb most of the economic pain, though the Inland Northwest will feel it.
"We will be participating in a national and regional slowdown that was going to happen without the electrical problem. " As Kuharski projected, we found that people like Jodie Orcutt were already cutting back on optional expenses because of high energy bills. "We had a 240 dollar heat bill one month." They have a pool, and with energy costs this year to be 50 percent higher than last year, they'll be cutting back on more than suntan lotion.
"We may not open the pool as soon, we may not heat the pool at all." When could we get some more water to charge that economic battery sitting behind the dam, at least not until next winter. Longer if climate changes place us in a long term drought cycle.
by News 4
(3/14/2001 5:20:00 PM)