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This article introduces the Franz Boas Papers: Documentary Edition (FBP) project. In addition to describing the scope of the project, including the various partners, collaborators and goals of the project, this article speaks to both the reasons and timeliness of carrying out a much needed revisionist assessment of Franz Boas for contemporary audiences. Given that Boas carried out much of his fieldwork with Indigenous peoples in the Pacific Northwest, this project and the collaborations it will facilitate promise to make crucial contributions to anthropological understandings of his work in the twenty-first century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The article presents a list of publications in 2012 about the history and culture of the Pacific Northwest region in North America including "Kesu': The Art and Life of Doug Cranmer" by Jennifer Kramer, "Lake Chelan: The Greatest Lake in the World," by John Fahey and "Skyjack: The Hunt for D. B. Cooper" by Geoffrey Gray.

The forest industry is constantly changing, and technology is constantly shifting the bar for efficiency and profitability. To maintain competitiveness and control costs in a global market, an efficient log tracking method must be used by regional stakeholders in the log supply chain from stump to mill to end consumer. It is important to understand the implications of recent innovations in log tracking for stakeholders in the Pacific Northwest in the context of a global economy, and how innovations in other regions may affect the future of log tracking. In this report, we (1) discuss the importance of log tracking technology, (2) review both regional and international efforts to harness technology for tracking logs from stump to mill, (3) report on a regional survey that examines the current status of log tracking in the Pacific Northwest, and (4) identify the most promising technologies that could be implemented in the near future. The majority of regional stakeholders use paper tags or other relatively simple tagging methods. Radio frequency identification (RFID) tags and other tracer technologies were not used when marking, sorting, tracking, or paying for logs by any of the regional organizations responding to the survey. RFID tags and spray-on code marking show promise for the near future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I investigate the interaction of knowledge and institutions in the context of First Nations in the Pacific Northwest of Canada who have evolved management systems for fish and forest resources over hundreds of years. These management systems are viewed as institutions that are based on and apply knowledge systems over time. In the Nisga'a and Haida nations, knowledge systems guide management regimes that govern access, rights and responsibilities, harvesting, allocation of benefits and costs, technology, education and training. For the past hundred years these institutions and knowledge systems have come into conflict with knowledge and management systems imposed first by missionaries, settlers and colonizers and later from Provincial and National governments and corporations holding tenure rights assigned by those governments. National and international regimes such as the Law of the Seas and the Exclusive Economic Zones conflict with traditional institutions and knowledge systems by privileging one level of governance and consequently one form of knowledge and devaluing others. The paper is based on research conducted in the Pacific Northwest over the past eight years, primarily through interviews with elders, decision-makers, and resource users, as well as observation of cultural and resource practices. The research investigated the impacts of conflicting knowledge systems and the attempts to resolve those conflicts. The paper raises questions about knowledge systems and institutions, about institutional interplay, and the impact of international institutions on local institutions as they come into contact and conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines contemporary, independent publishing in the Pacific Northwest (USA and Canada). Through a series of interviews with small publishers in Seattle, Portland, and Vancouver, BC, this paper will investigate whether independent publishers, based outside of the major publishing hubs of New York and Toronto, believe they can: compete in the global publishing environment; help to promote and preserve regional cultures and identities; and maintain diversity in cultural output. It will also explore how independent presses see themselves situated in the national and international publishing arena and identify what structures are in place to support them to do so. Although the focus of the empirical research is the Pacific Northwest, this paper has been contextualised within national publishing discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global climate change due to increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases has stimulated numerous studies and discussions about its possible impacts on water resources. Climate scenarios generated by climate models at spatial resolutions ranging from about 50 km to 400 km may not provide enough spatial specificity for use in impact assessment. In Parts I and II of this paper, the spatial specificity issue is addressed by examining what information on mesoscale and small-scale spatial features can be gained by using a regional climate model with a subgrid parameterization of orographic precipitation and land surface cover, driven by a general circulation model. Numerical experiments have been performed to simulate the present-day climatology and the climate conditions corresponding to a doubling of atmospheric CO[sub2] concentration. This paper describes and contrasts the large-scale and mesoscale features of the greenhouse warming climate signals simulated by the general circulation model and regional climate model over the Pacific Northwest. Results indicate that changes in the large-scale circulation exhibit strong seasonal variability. There is an average warming of about 2°C, and precipitation generally increases over the Pacific Northwest and decreases over California. The precipitation signal over the Pacific Northwest is only statistically significant during spring, when both the change in the large-scale circulation and increase in water vapor enhance the moisture convergence toward the north Pacific coast. The combined effects of surface temperature and precipitation changes are such that snow cover is reduced by up to 50% on average, causing large changes in the seasonal runoff. This paper also describes the high spatial resolution (1.5 km) climate signals simulated by the regional climate model. Reductions in snow cover of 50%-90% are found in areas near the snow line of the control simulation. Analyses of the variations of the... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the importance of frequency dispersion in the propagation of recent trans-Pacific tsunamis. Frequency dispersion induces a time delay for the most energetic waves, which increases for long propagation distances and short source dimensions. To calculate this time delay, propagation of tsunamis is simulated and analysed from spectrograms of time-series at specific gauges in the Pacific Ocean. 1-D and 2-D simulations are performed by solving either shallow-water (SW) or Boussinesq equations and by considering realistic seismic sources. 1-D sensitivity tests are first performed in a constant-depth channel to study the influence of the source width. 2-D tests are then performed in a simulated Pacific Ocean with a 4000-m constant depth and by considering tectonic sources of 2010 and 2015 Chilean earthquakes. For these sources, both the azimuth and the distance play a major role in the frequency dispersion of tsunamis. Finally, simulations are performed considering the real bathymetry of the Pacific Ocean. Multiple reflections, refractions as well as shoaling of waves result in much more complex time-series for which the effects of the frequency dispersion are hardly discernible. The main point of this study is to evaluate frequency dispersion in terms of traveltime delays by calculating spectrograms for a time window of 6 hr after the arrival of the first wave. Results of the spectral analysis show that the wave packets recorded by pressure and tide sensors in the Pacific Ocean seem to be better reproduced by the Boussinesq model than the SW model and approximately follow the theoretical dispersion relationship linking wave arrival times and frequencies. Additionally, a traveltime delay is determined above which effects of frequency dispersion are considered to be significant in terms of maximum surface elevations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the features and possible causes of sea surface temperature (SST) biases over the Northwest Pacific are investigated based on a mixed-layer heat budget analysis in 21 coupled general circulation models (CGCMs) from phase 5 of the Coupled Model Inter-comparison Project (CMIP5). Most CMIP5 models show cold SST biases throughout the year over the Northwest Pacific. The largest biases appear during summer, and the smallest biases occur during winter. These cold SST biases are seen at the basin scale and are mainly located in the inner region of the low and mid-latitudes. According to the mixed-layer heat budget analysis, overestimation of upward net sea surface heat fluxes associated with atmospheric processes are primarily responsible for the cold SST biases. Among the different components of surface heat fluxes, overestimated upward latent heat fluxes induced by the excessively strong surface winds contribute the most to the cold SST biases during the spring, autumn, and winter seasons. Conversely, during the summer, overestimated upward latent heat fluxes and underestimated downward solar radiations at the sea surface are equally important. Further analysis suggests that the overly strong surface winds over the Northwest Pacific during winter and spring are associated with excessive precipitation over the Maritime Continent region, whereas those occurring during summer and autumn are associated with the excessive northward extension of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ). The excessive precipitation over the Maritime Continent region and the biases in the simulated ITCZ induce anomalous northeasterlies, which are in favor of enhancing low-level winds over the North Pacific. The enhanced surface wind increases the sea surface evaporation, which contributes to the excessive upward latent heat fluxes. Thus, the SST over the Northwest Pacific cools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The document titled "Northwest History News Notes" is a compilation of articles from different publications that cover a wide range of topics related to the history and culture of the Pacific Northwest region. These topics include the Klondike Gold Rush, the Winter Olympic Games in Alaska, the history of Alaska's shipping industry, Native American history, the impact of the railroad on Tacoma, and the potato industry in the Tanana Valley. The articles provide valuable insights into the diverse and rich history of the Pacific Northwest. Additionally, the document provides a list of various articles and books that cover topics such as settler-colonial labor, indigenous religious traditions, historical events, breweries, historical figures, and cultural heritage. [Extracted from the article]

The paper discusses the risk for an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) in the Pacific NortWest Economic Region (PNWER). Topics examined throughout the paper include: why PNWER is vulnerable to FMD, risks to Canada and the U.S. for the introduction of FMD, response strategies, and preventative measures. These topics will identify a number of challenges that region will face if an outbreak were to occur including illegal trade, movement of people, livestock movements, vaccination, and zoning. There is also a discussion in these topics around potential strategies that could be used on both sides of the border to minimize the impact of an outbreak both from an animal welfare perspective and from a trade and economic perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Pacific Northwest state and federal agencies and tribes that operate salmon and steelhead ( Oncorhynchus sp.) hatcheries are authorized to develop and implement strategies to reduce the risks the programs pose to wild fish populations. This paper reviews five case studies from the states of Oregon and Washington, USA, where agencies and tribes have implemented or proposed programs that were intended to reduce ecological risks due to hatchery programs. The case studies are for Oregon coho salmon, Select Area terminal fisheries programs for Chinook and coho salmon in the lower Columbia River, Hood Canal chum salmon in Puget Sound Washington, Siletz River steelhead on the Oregon coast, and Okanogan River Chinook salmon in eastern Washington. The five case studies address a diversity of management objectives and species. They demonstrate some of the science and risk reduction strategies used to alleviate the ecological effects of hatcheries, and they document some of the results and outcomes of taking action. Elements of four of the case studies have been in place for nearly 20 years. The available science and the conservation ethic toward hatchery programs evolved significantly over this period, and management decisions and strategies have been influenced by public policy as well as by scientific information. Therefore the case studies also document some of the history, the evolution of ideas, the uncertainty, and the political controversy associated with the management of this risk factor. The paper concludes with six principles to help guide the development of future risk reduction programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper contributes to recent postcolonial debates about the cartography of European expansion and its implications for constructing North American landscapes. It does so by moving beyond a pure deconstructionist critique of mapping by drawing on range of theoretical literature that encourages a view of cartography as being inextricably tied to the social relations of production and consumption. In particular, it emphasizes the point that maps have social lives not necessarily different in kind from other forms of material culture. Drawing on the cartographic creation of the northwest, the argument develops through examining the social and material dimensions of map making and its afterlife. The paper suggests, therefore, that the 'power of maps' had varying and often contradictory outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the Yakima Sahaptin bipartite construction and identifies the syntactic and semantic qualities of the morphemes that combine in these constructions. Four types of bipartite constructions in the language are identified and described: (1) change of state (COS): lexical prefix and COS stem; (2) caused motion: lexical prefix and locative/directive stem; (3) motion/location of an entity: lexical prefix and locative/directive stem; (4) manner of motion: lexical prefix and locative/directive stem. Additionally, less readily categorized outliers of bipartite constructions are discussed, including verbs with the causative prefixes shapá- and chá- and the formation of bipartite and tripartite stems based on the roots wíi- 'go, go with speed' and wyá- 'while going'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In common with much of the western United States, the Pacific Northwest (defined in this paper as Washington and Oregon) has experienced an unusual number of droughts in the past decade. This paper describes three of these droughts in terms of the precipitation, temperature, and soil moisture anomalies, and discusses different drought impacts experienced in the Pacific Northwest (PNW). For the first drought, in 2001, low winter precipitation in the PNW produced very low streamflow that primarily affected farmers and hydropower generation. For the second, in 2003, low summer precipitation in Washington (WA), and low summer precipitation and a warm winter in Oregon (OR) primarily affected streamflow and forests. For the last, in 2005, a lack of snowpack due to warm temperatures during significant winter precipitation events in WA, and low winter precipitation in OR, had a variety of different agricultural and hydrologic impacts. Although the proximal causes of droughts are easily quantified, the ultimate causes are not as clear. Better precipitation observations in the PNW are required to provide timely monitoring of conditions leading to droughts to improve prediction in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Holarctic genus Oemopteryx is represented in the Nearctic region by three species groups, including the far western O. vanduzeea group. In this paper, we redescribe and illustrate O. vanduzeea (Claassen, 1937) and describe O. leei sp. n. from California and Oregon, USA. The new species is distinguished in the male from O. vanduzeea by the epiproct complex having a tongue-shaped prong that is hood-like at the apex, by the sleeve containing a filament that bears a terminal hook, and by a ventral, elongate, finger-like process that inserts into the apex of the prong. The female of O. leei sp. n. exhibits a large, wide subgenital plate that terminates in a narrow notched apex, whereas the subgenital plate is smaller and trapezoidal, with a flat, truncate margin in O. vanduzeea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several languages of northwestern North America systematically fail to show obviation (“Condition C”) effects in contexts where an R-expression is c-commanded by a covalued pronoun. This paper examines Condition C-defying dependencies in one such language, St’át’imcets (Lillooet Salish). It is shown here that Condition C violations in St’át’imcets are not confined to coreference anaphora, since they may involve sloppy identity; however they are limited to cases where the dependency (a) does not contain a quantificational expression and (b) crosses a clause boundary. Employing a version of linking theory, this paper argues that Condition C-defying dependencies are “upside-down”—rather than involving a name unexpectedly depending on a c-commanding pronoun, they involve a dependent pronoun c-commanding an antecedent name. In order to account for this possibility, a parametrized version of the Independence Principle (Safir 2004b) is invoked, whose domain in St’át’imcets is restricted to the minimal clause. The facts here provide a direct challenge to the Universalist Hypothesis on anaphora. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper synthesizes information on the spatial and temporal dynamics of wood in small streams in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The literature on this topic is somewhat confused due to a lack of an accepted definition of what constitutes "small" streams and what is the relative size of woody debris contained within the channel. This paper presents a matrix that defines woody debris relative to channel size and then discusses the components of a wood budget. Headwater streams are in close proximity to wood sources and, in steeplands, are often tightly constrained by steep hillslopes. Special consideration is given to ecosystem characteristics and to management practices that affect the wood dynamics in this context. Knowledge gaps and uncertainties that can be used to guide future research are identified. Very little is currently known about the role of mass wasting in wood recruitment and storage relative to other processes, such as bank erosion and mortality, in larger streams. Further, very little work has addressed the relative importance of different wood depletion processes, especially those associated with wood transport. The effect of other ecosystem variables on wood dynamics locally across a watershed (from valley bottom to mountaintop) and regionally across the landscape (from maritime to continental climates) is not addressed. Finally, the scientific community has only begun to deal with the effects of management practices on wood quantity, structure, and movement in small streams. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The residual woody biomass (a.k.a. harvest slash) produced during forest harvest operations in the Pacific Northwest is generally collected into piles and burned and/or left on the forest floor to decompose. Producing drop-in biofuels from this residual cellulosic feedstock can provide an alternative use for this unused resource while simultaneously displacing petroleum based fuels. Utilizing a ‘Woods-to-Wake’ (WoTW) Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach, which is comparable to a Well-to-Wake (WTW) LCA for petroleum based aviation fuel, this paper assesses the environmental implications of feedstock recovery, production, and utilization of residual woody biomass based biojet fuel. This paper also presents a comparative assessment of the environmental implications of substituting petroleum based jet fuel with that of residual woody biomass based biojet fuel. The bioconversion process presented in this paper uses a mild bisulfite pre-treatment of the feedstock to liberate the C5 and C6 sugars which then go through enzymatic hydrolysis and saccharification to produce fermentable sugars. The sugars are then converted to bio-jet fuel (iso-paraffinic kerosene, IPK) using a proprietary biocatalytic fermentation and oligomerization process. The WoTW environmental implications of producing woody biomass based jet-fuel are then compared to the WTW environmental impacts of producing petroleum based jet-fuel. The results reveal that the WoTW global warming impact of residual wood based bio-jet fuel represents a 78% improvement over the WTW global warming impact of petroleum-based jet fuel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The prevalence of human trafficking for the purposes of sexual exploitation and forced labour in the Pacific Northwest has been well documented in recent years. This paper focuses specifically on trafficking for sex work across the British Columbia and Washington State border and seeks to determine whether the border is an effective instrument or tool for the identification and intervention of human trafficking for sex work. We provide an exploration of the legal frameworks and policies on either side of the border and offer an analysis of the cross-border anti-trafficking efforts carried out at the borderlands. The paper concludes that current mechanisms fail to appropriately address and combat the issue of cross-border sex trafficking for several reasons, including the following: a lack of uniform definitions of sex trafficking; the conflation of migrant sex work and sex trafficking, leading to misidentification at the border; and an emphasis on border security measures over victim support. Recommendations for enhanced responses are provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Streams in the Pacific Northwest (Oregon, Washington, British Columbia) face rising summer temperatures and increasing anthropogenic influence, with consequences for fish populations. Guidance is needed in small managed watersheds for setting reservoir release rates or for the restriction of water extractions to meet the needs of fish and aquatic ecosystems. Existing environmental flow methods focus on discharge rates and do not typically consider water temperatures, and detailed thermal models are too complex for widespread implementation. We used multiple logistic regression to develop statistical models for estimating the probability of exceeding a salmonid stream temperature threshold of 22 °C as a function of discharge and maximum daily air temperatures. Data required are air temperature, stream temperature and stream discharge over a minimum of one summer. The models are used to make minimum discharge recommendations under varying forecast weather conditions. The method was applied to nine streams in the Pacific Northwest. Minimum recommended discharge generally ranged from 23% to 86% of mean annual discharge and was higher than observed low flows in most streams. Comparison of the new method to existing methods for Fortune Creek in British Columbia indicated that total season discharge volumes could be reduced while meeting thermal requirements. For other streams, it was evident that high water temperatures cannot be managed by increasing discharge, as the discharge required would be greater than natural discharge and higher than achievable by management. The statistical method described in this paper allows for a risk-based approach to discharge management for fish habitat needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we attempt to clarify the identity of two purportedly new species of amnicolid snails in Pacific Northwest lakes that were vaguely described in grey literature and recently petitioned for federal listing. As currently understood the western American amnicolid fauna consists of the endemic genus Colligyrus (three species) and Amnicola limosa, which is distributed in a single site in western Montana (and also throughout much of eastern North America). The 'Washington duskysnail' was proposed for the Montana population of A. limosa and two recently discovered populations in northern Washington. The 'masked duskysnail' is a small amnicolid of uncertain generic status from two lakes in northern Washington. Our assessment of these putative species was based on genetic and morphological study of specimens from previously reported sites and recently discovered localities in Montana (both snails) and Washington (the first only). Molecular analyses (based on the mtCOI gene) resolved the western American populations of Amnicola as a weakly supported subunit of a clade that also contained eastern A. limosa and A. dalli; the western Amnicola differed from eastern A. limosa and A. dalli by 2.1% mean sequence divergence. We also found that western Amnicola and eastern A. limosa do not differ in body pigmentation as previously postulated and that these snails are closely similar in all other morphological details. We conclude that the Washington duskysnail is not a distinct species and that all of the western populations of Amnicola are A. limosa. This finding extends the range of A. limosa westward almost to the Pacific margin. Our molecular phylogenetic analyses and study of the female reproductive anatomy of the masked duskysnail congruently indicated that this snail, which was previously compared with other western amnicolids, belongs to the genus Lyogyrus, which is otherwise restricted to eastern North America. We were unable to resolve the taxonomic status of the masked duskysnail further, owing to the paucity of pertinent data for the poorly known eastern Lyogyrus fauna. We recommend that the masked duskysnail be treated as 'Lyogyrus sp.' pending further study of this genus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT The 1994 Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP) resulted in the protection of over 11 million acres of public forestland in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. This paper quantifies the amenity effect arising from protected NWFP lands on long-run community economic growth. Using community fixed effects and postmatching panel regression to control for many sources of bias, we find highly localized and positive amenity impacts on the growth in median income, population, and property values for small communities close to protected NWFP land, as compared to communities far from the NWFP. We find no effect on medium-sized communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From 1937 to 1948, the International Woodworkers of America challenged the timber industry's forestry practices, attempting to reshape the Northwest's timber industry to work for the sustainability of logging communities and the forest instead of corporate profits. Their activities demonstrate the long history of unions pressing for the environmental agenda of their members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the links between the material and symbolic nature of timber extraction during the Pacific Northwest (pnw) timber wars of the 1980s and 1990s. Applying Durkheim's work on religion and social solidarity, the authors consider a form of logger religion that emerged through many years of pnw timber production, shaping the identities of loggers and timber community dynamics. This paper proposes that forests are spaces that bridge the sacred and profane. Our evaluation examines a totemic meaning assigned to loggers originating from forest-based labour and reinforced by timber communities through rituals. Throughout the timber wars, loggers also developed a conflicted consciousness, stemming from their connection to and the destruction of forests. Given the character of logger religion that existed, the deployment of forest management and community development policies may not adequately re-create tacit relationships between the sacred and profane, previously damaged as a result of the drastic decline in timber production in the PNW. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The distinction between contemporary Native American fish consumption rates and original baseline heritage rates is important as heritage rates have long been recognized as a baseline relevant to the fishing tribes of the Pacific Northwest, and are generally protected by Treaties and case law. This paper reviews two approaches to accurately defining heritage fish consumption rates in the Columbia Basin. One approach is dietary reconstruction based on several lines of evidence (ethnographic, archaeological, historical ecology, nutritional) to estimate overall dietary composition and the caloric contribution of fish, especially salmon. The second approach is review of abundance, harvest, and consumption rates augmented with ethnographic and archaeological evidence over the same geographical area. The two methods independently arrive at the same range for heritage rates, and the wealth of evidence that has accumulated over 75 years of investigation suggests that these are robust conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Collaborative watershed group experiences reveal commonalities in their approaches to facilitate decentralized and inclusive watershed planning and management in the United States, and increasingly around the world. Although watershed groups are widely recognized in the United States for positive accomplishments across local, state, and regional scales, the role of government agencies as watershed group partners often remains ambiguous and inconsistent. This paper details results of a survey used to determine the status of Pacific Northwest (PNW) watershed group-agency partnerships relative to planning and management. Specific inquiry was directed toward: (1) the role of technical information flow; and (2) watershed group needs. Mail surveys were administered to 304 watershed group participants in Idaho, Oregon, and Washington. Sixty-nine percent of the surveys were completed and returned. Based on the collected survey data, PNW watershed groups rely heavily on agency officials for technical watershed information. Respondents perceive support of state government to be the highest relative to federal agencies, local governments, and university Extension offices. However, evidence from the survey suggests that partnerships are underutilized across all agencies and organizations concurrently vested in watershed planning and management in the PNW. Sustained operational funding, increased group participation, and baseline watershed data are the most pressing needs of PNW watershed groups and present a significant opportunity for expanding watershed group-agency partnerships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Results from a regional climate model simulation show substantial increases in future flood risk (2040-69) in many Pacific Northwest river basins in the early fall. Two primary causes are identified: 1) more extreme and earlier storms and 2) warming temperatures that shift precipitation from snow to rain dominance over regional terrain. The simulations also show a wide range of uncertainty among different basins stemming from localized storm characteristics. While previous research using statistical downscaling suggests that many areas in the Pacific Northwest are likely to experience substantial increases in flooding in response to global climate change, these initial estimates do not adequately represent the effects of changes in heavy precipitation. Unlike statistical downscaling techniques applied to global climate model scenarios, the regional model provides an explicit, physically based simulation of the seasonality, size, location, and intensity of historical and future extreme storms, including atmospheric rivers. This paper presents climate projections from the ECHAM5/Max Planck Institute Ocean Model (MPI-OM) global climate model dynamically downscaled using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model implemented at 12-km resolution for the period 1970-2069. The resulting daily precipitation and temperature data are bias corrected and used as input to a physically based Variable Infiltration Capacity (VIC) hydrologic model. From the daily time step simulations of streamflow produced by the hydrologic model, probability distributions are fit to the extreme events extracted from each water year and flood statistics for various return intervals are estimated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 1980s, the US Pacific Northwest has been shattered by a major environmental policy conflict related to the management of Federal forests. These “timber wars” were similar to forest environmental policy conflicts in several other countries, but were particularly polarized. They resulted in a significant change in Federal forest policy from timber production orientation to biodiversity conservation. The change occurred suddenly and had significant economic and social consequences within the region and beyond, but was embedded in long-term societal and institutional trends. In this paper, I adopt an interpretive approach in order to, first, understand contemporary interpretations of the 1993 policy change and, second, to reconstruct the contemporary discursive ‘landscape’ of the Pacific Northwest including the major resource management paradigms and narratives that guide policy making in this region today. Empirically, my interpretation is mostly built on 37 qualitative interviews with policy stakeholders that were conducted in the summer of 2011. Based on this evidence, the paper argues that there are four narratives circulating amongst policy stakeholders that represent different conceptualizations of the 1993 policy change. Yet, all narratives highlight the importance of environmental strategy making that mobilized the socio-institutional setting in order to prepare and finally achieve the change. Current forest policy in the region is characterized by a policy stalemate resulting from the confluence of diverse institutional, context-related factors and the inability of stakeholders to create enough contradictions or crisis by combining these factors in order to promote change-enabling narratives. Four resource management paradigms compete in the region and, within these, narratives and counter narratives on physical and social events are developed. Current forest policy is dominated by an ecosystem management paradigm, but forest management practices aim to reconcile demands arising from the different paradigms to a certain degree, for instance via the concept of “ecological restoration”. Yet, given that the material base that feeds such compromises is finite, a new crisis in Pacific Northwest forest policy in the future is likely. In conclusion, this paper offers an interpretation of Pacific Northwest forest policy (change) as a process in which social and physical events are ‘discursively mobilized’ by means of narratives that are produced against the background of major natural resources paradigms. This includes the art of ‘discourse agents’ in constructing problematizations and intervention logics to either defend the current policy state or to increase the likelihood of change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are growing strains on the electric grid as cooling peaks grow and equipment ages. Increased penetration of renewables on the grid is also straining electricity supply systems and the need for flexible demand is growing. This paper summarizes results of a series of field test of automated demand response systems in large buildings in the Pacific Northwest. The objective of the research was twofold. One objective was to evaluate the use demand response automation technologies. A second objective was to evaluate control strategies that could change the electric load shape in both winter and summer conditions. Winter conditions focused on cold winter mornings, a time when the electric grid is often stressed. The summer test evaluated DR strategies in the afternoon. We found that we could automate both winter and summer control strategies with the open automated demand response communication standard. The buildings were able to provide significant demand response in both winter and summer events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Changes in key drivers (e.g., climate, disturbance regimes and land use) may affect the sustainability of forest landscapes and set the stage for increased tension among competing ecosystem services. We addressed two questions about a suite of supporting, regulating and provisioning ecosystem services in each of two well-studied forest landscapes in the western US: (1) How might the provision of ecosystem services change in the future given anticipated trajectories of climate, disturbance regimes, and land use? (2) What is the role of spatial heterogeneity in sustaining future ecosystem services? We determined that future changes in each region are likely to be distinct, but spatial heterogeneity (e.g., the amount and arrangement of surviving forest patches or legacy trees after disturbance) will be important in both landscapes for sustaining forest regeneration, primary production, carbon storage, natural hazard regulation, insect and pathogen regulation, timber production and wildlife habitat. The paper closes by highlighting five general priorities for future research. The science of landscape ecology has much to contribute toward understanding ecosystem services and how land management can enhance-or threaten-the sustainability of ecosystem services in changing landscapes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Matrix-valued radially symmetric covariance functions (also called radial basis functions in the numerical analysis literature) are crucial for the analysis, inference and prediction of Gaussian vector-valued random fields. This paper provides different methodologies for the construction of matrix-valued mappings that are positive definite and compactly supported over the sphere of a d-dimensional space, of a given radius. In particular, we offer a representation based on scaled mixtures of Askey functions; we also suggest a method of construction based on B-splines. Finally, we show that the very appealing convolution arguments are indeed effective when working in one dimension, prohibitive in two and feasible, but substantially useless, when working in three dimensions. We exhibit the statistical performance of the proposed models through simulation study and then discuss the computational gains that come from our constructions when the parameters are estimated via maximum likelihood. We finally apply our constructions to a North American Pacific Northwest temperatures dataset. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a cohort of 157 Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation insured banks based in the Pacific Northwest, this paper examines regional bank risk-taking over the 2001-2007 economic expansion. The focus is on on-balance sheet assets that carry a 100% risk weighting in the calculation of regulatory capital ratios. This study finds that Pacific Northwest banks significantly increased their share of 100% risk-weighted assets between 2001 and 2007, largely through commercial real estate lending. Asset size, market concentration, age, metropolitan statistical area-location, and balance sheet capacity for risk-taking are statistically significant predictors of the change in the share of 100% risk-weighted assets over the period of interest. ( JEL G21, R11) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The grape and wine industries in the Pacific Northwest have evolved in quite different ways. The expansion of the wine industry in British Columbia has been driven by increased competition resulting from the enactment of the Canada–US Free Trade Agreement in the late 1980s. In contrast, the grape and wine industries of Washington State and Oregon have expanded in response to global market trends in consumers changing life styles and wine preferences. In this paper, we explore the changing production and export trends of the Pacific Northwest wine industries over the last decade and analyze how these trends have been influenced by government regulations, business organizations, and export promotion programs. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper comparatively analyzes processes of contemporary borderlands identity formation in the context of reinforced security and socio-economic integration in the cross-border regions of the Pacific Northwest and the Virgin Islands. Interviews and surveys of stakeholders reveal how narratives of belonging enable the articulation of a pluralist borderlands identity even in the context of re-aligned border security and socio-economic cross-border integration. The asymmetry in the relationships between the United States and its neighbors - Canada and the Virgin Islands - is as integral to security and integration as to expressions of borderlands identity. While notions of belonging in these cross-border regions remain in transition, expressions of localism are already creating a baseline for a pluralist version of transnational identity formation and culture. A tentative official movement beyond dominant notions of US security, as focused on its borders with Mexico and Canada, toward more flexible conceptualizations of perimeter security that have characterized the Virgin Islands, may also assist in the formation of such 'new regionalisms' and transnational borderlands identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]