The Denver Post,

Prairies can absorb greenhouse carbon, but wildfires send it right back into the atmosphere

There has been a lot written about how oceans and peat bogs and rainforests soak-up greenhouse gas carbon, but a new U.S. Geological Survey study calculates that the American West is also doing its part sequestering about 91 million metric tons of carbon each year. Not bad for the region’s mix of grass, shrub and forest.

The nearly 100 million tons absorbed by western ecosystems is equivalent to the carbon emitted by more than 83 million passenger cars a year in the U.S.

The area studied extends from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific coastal waters, and totals just over 1 million square miles. It includes well-known ecosystems, such as the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada Mountains, the Mojave and Sonoran deserts, the Pacific Northwest forests and the vast grasslands and shrublands of the Great Basin.

All is not rosy, however. Climate change could dramatically alter the budget and the trend to increasing wildfires could send the balance in other direction. Wildfires between 2001 and 2008 added carbon equal to 13 percent of the carbon being sequestered. That could rise to 31 percent in the future.

And then there were six.

Intrawest, once the most dominant resort operator in North America with a dozen ski resorts and eight villages fueling a $2.7 billion empire, has sold its remaining interest in its flagship Whistler Blackcomb ski area to Denver private equity firm KSL Capital, marking the end of a quarter century anchored at the continent’s busiest ski area.

After jettisoning properties in 2009 and 2010 – including Copper Mountain, the Village at Squaw, New Jersey’s Mountain Creek, Florida’s Sandestin, France’s Les Arc and British Columbia’s Panorama – the now Denver-based Intrawest is down to six ski hills, including Steamboat and a long-term management deal at Denver-owned Winter Park.

Intrawest acquired Blackcomb from the Aspen Skiing Co. in 1986, as company founder Joe Houssian expanded beyond urban real estate development. A decade later Intrawest bought Whistler and Copper Mountain and was publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker IDR.

In 2006, Intrawest ruled the resort world. It had annual revenues of $1.6 billion, with a real estate portfolio that included plans for more than 21,000 half-a-million-dollar resort village units. It had nearly 25,000 employees at ten ski resorts that hosted more than 7 million skier visits.

That year it was acquired by private equity firm Fortress Investment Group in a highly leveraged deal.
Then the economy soured. Resort real estate plunged. Fortress struggled under its debt, missing a critical payment in 2009. Three years ago, Intrawest started selling properties in a debt-shedding fire sale.

Whistler Blackcomb sold as public stock in 2010, with Intrawest holding 24 percent, or a little more than 9 million shares, and Whistler Blackcomb Holdings Corp. owning the rest. The deal generated $300 million for Intrawest, which was used to pay down Fortress’s $1.4 billion debt.

Today, Intrawest is leaner. From its 115-employee headquarters in downtown Denver, it operates four luxury resorts and owns five ski areas in Ontario, Quebec, West Virginia, Vermont and Colorado.

Garbanzo Mediterranean Grill, a Denver-based fast casual restaurant, will hold the grand opening of its Denver West location on Friday (Dec. 7).

The new restaurant, located at 14740 W. Colfax Ave. in Lakewood in the new Promenade at Denver West development, is the company’s 16th to open in Colorado and the 18th nationwide.

“We have had our sights set on opening in the Denver West community for some time now,” said Alon Mor, founder, president and CEO of Garbanzo. “With an ideal location near major shopping centers and business parks, we are expected to provide those who live and work in the area with a convenient, healthy and fresh Mediterranean option.”

The new location, just west of Colorado Mills, is holding a fundraising dinner for Denver CASA, a nonprofit that recruits, trains and supports volunteers to represent the best interests of abused and neglected children in the Denver Juvenile Courts. The fundraiser is set for Thursday (Dec. 6) from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., with a suggested donation of $5.

On grand opening day, guests have the opportunity to win free Garbanzo menu items and other prices, including Garbanzo tote bags, T-shirts and gift cards.

Following the grand opening, the store is holding several giveaways all month long, from an electronic reader to a bicycle. For more information about the giveaways and how to enter, visit the company’s Facebook page at www.Facebook.com/GarbanzoMedGrill.

SlaterPaull Architects of Denver has been selected to provide architectural services for several higher education projects throughout the state, including the renovation of the Fiske Planetarium at the University of Colorado in Boulder.

SlaterPaull also is involved in the renovation of the 5th Street Hub building on the Auraria Higher Education campus, a program plan for Colorado State University’s Rockwell Hall at the College of Business, and the $12 million academic office building at the University of Colorado-Colorado Springs.

The $2.6 million renovation of Fiske Planetarium includes an extensive technology upgrade in order to keep the planetarium up-to-date and able to serve the university and the community for years to come.

The first phase of the 5th Street Hub renovation will include the UCD automotive engineering program and the MSU biodiesel program, both of which will be completed for the start of the 2013 spring semester.

SlaterPaull will provide architectural programming services and potential design services for an addition and renovation to CSU’s Rockwell Hall.

The green architectural firm is targeting LEED Gold certification for the facility at UCCS that will house faculty and staff offices.

The new Drive office building in Zeppelin Development’s Taxi complex in River North has opened and is fully leased.

The 38,000-square-foot, four-story structure includes a mix of creative high-tech firms, with Boa Technology — maker of the award-winning, patented Boa Closure System — occupying nearly two-thirds of the building.

The building is a collaboration between Zeppelin, lead designer Stephen Dynia Architects and the architect of record, Barker Rinker Seacat — both of which are Taxi-based businesses.

Zeppelin calls Drive the furthest evolution of the overall Taxi project, with a more democratic format than virtually any other office building in the market. Small, dynamic firms are located on the top and lower floors, with Boa located in between.

The building includes 53 operating glass garage doors, which afford tenants an open-air work environment with natural light and views, and an 80-foot skylight with corresponding glass floors that transmit sunlight throughout the building from the rooftop.

Other tenants include a hair and nail salon, sandwich counter and coffee shop.

The groundwork for the Federal Aviation Administration’s NextGen airport modernization program was completed yesterday at Denver International Airport. Proponents say the new performance-based navigation technology — called area navigation with required navigation performance (RNAV RNP) — will reduce delays and improve efficiency.

Jeppesen, an Englewood-based subsidiary of Boeing Co., collaborated with DIA and the FAA to incorporate its technology in what is the most comprehensive rollout of its kind in the nation.

Mike Pound, manager of corporate communications for Jeppesen, says that the technology will increase runway throughput, lessen flyover noise, and reduce aircraft fuel burn – saving the airlines cash and lower carbon emissions.

“Bottom line is you get much more precise navigation,” Pound said. “These arrivals are more of a continuous landing than a step-by-step path.”

Air traffic controllers currently piece together flight plans using a vectored system. Each aircraft is instructed step-by-step as to when and where they can change altitude during descent. The new system gives each pilot and aircraft one flight path out of several predetermined routes, with the goal of producing a more fluid navigation stream.

“By getting airplanes to fly that precise and repeatable course, airplane-after-airplane, you know exactly where those airplanes will be,” Pound said.

Experts predict that the the air traffic controllers’ ongoing game of airspace Tetris will be minimized.

However, due to the current, semi-modernized phase of U.S. airspace, aircraft landing at DIA will continue to use a mixture of conventional, beacon-to-beacon navigation and the new performance-based system until the entire NextGen program is implemented nationwide.

Depending on the approach route, airline partners estimate the new technology could reduce the miles traveled by 5 to 20 miles per flight — saving 150 lbs. of fuel.

If only 50 flights a day landed using this system, that equals a savings of 7,500 lbs. of fuel daily. Multiplied out, it would save to 2,737,500 lbs., or more than 400,000 gallons, of fuel each year for aircraft landing at DIA.

At the most recent three-month average of $3.15/gallon, that adds up to nearly $1.3 million in fuel savings.

“Airports like this because they are more neighborhood-friendly with less airplanes flying around there at a low altitude,” Pound said.

While DIA may like its “neighborhood-friendliness,” it likely enjoyed the pricetag even more: free.

Jeppesen did all of the work free-of-charge.

“We did the work for DIA because they are right here in our backyard, and it was a good way to showcase our capabilities,” Pound said. “It was just the ideal place to put this to the test.”

Similar RNAV technology is already used in Los Angeles, Miami, and Atlanta, but Pound says that none of them are as comprehensive as DIA, which uses the technology for planes arriving from all directions.

Summit Eden from Summit on Vimeo.

Four years ago, a handful of 20-something entrepreneurs gathered for a weekend ski trip in Park City, Utah, mingling turns with discussions about how good business could help the planet. Today the annual Summit Series draws 1,000 of the world’s top entrepreneurs, artists, scientists and players into a four-day, A-listed confab that has directed tens of millions toward worthy causes and sparked business-driven innovation.

And now the heralded Summit Series has its own ski hill.
The group on Monday announced it had acquired Utah’s bountiful Powder Mountain, a 10,000-acre Mecca of steep, deep and untrammeled ski terrain in the aptly named Eden Valley. The group raised $40 million for the purchase.

The long-rumored deal will give Summit a permanent homebase, with plans for 500 homes in a community on the southern side of Powder Mountain.

Founders will build the roads and homes for Summit Eden, which they dub “an epicenter of innovation in the heart of the Wasatch Mountains.”
“We would love to see incredible businesses get started here. We want to see non-profits that impact the world get their resources from the community. We want to see incredible music and beautiful art get created here. We look to create a platform, a community and a place that can empower this growth,” says Summit co-founder Jeff Rosenthal in a video announcement released Monday.

Powder Mountain opened in 1972 under the guidance of rancher-turned-doctor Alvin Cobabe. The mountain developed slowly, with an emphasis on skiing. Today, Pow Mow is a local’s paradise, with three mountains of wooded and open terrain offering everything from groomers to cat-accessed steeps to even helicopter skiing, all anchored from a modest, two-story base lodge. In 2006, Cobabe sold to a Utah investment group.

The mountain will remain open to the public. On its website, Summit said it has taken over management of Powder Mountain and “plans to preserve the character of the mountain.”

Crystal Rose owner Jay Byerly has signed a lease to operate Brittany Hill and will reopen the long-shuttered restaurant and event venue in January.

Crystal Rose — which already has two locations in Golden, one in southeast Denver, one in Littleton and a franchise in Colorado Springs — specializes in weddings and receptions but also handles corporate events, fundraisers, banquets and birthday and anniversary parties.

Byerly said Friday he plans to hire 40 to 50 employees, most of them part time, and already has a manager for the new facility, to be called Crystal Rose at Brittany Hill. He already has seven full-time employees and about 250 part-time workers.

He is taking reservations now for events beginning in January at the new location, and he also hopes to begin serving a Sunday brunch, which was a popular attraction of the original Brittany Hill.

“Before 2006, Brittany Hill routinely served 600 to 800 Sunday brunches a day; we intend to resume this tradition soon,” Byerly said.

Brittany Hill, featuring a panoramic view of the Denver area from its perch above Interstate 25 in Thornton, opened in 1981. It was the site of countless wedding receptions, anniversaries and graduations and was a favorite spot for romantic dinners and corporate meetings before closing in 2006.

The 17,200-square-foot facility had an abortive “grand reopening” on Nov. 17. Anaheim, Calif.-based Specialty Restaurants Corp. scheduled the event but had to cancel on short notice because of an issue with the city. Some fans of Brittany Hill showed up, only to be met with a closed, dark restaurant.

“It made us look real bad, but we had nothing to do with it,” Byerly said. “They scheduled it before we signed the lease.

“Crystal Rose has been doing private events for 25 years. If I tell you this is going to happen, I promise it will.”

Byerly said his crews continue to paint and clean and should soon finish renovating the kitchen.

He said his existing venues can comfortably accommodate between 150 and 325 people, while Brittany Hill has room for almost 900 people.

Byerly, whose firm does up to 700 events a year, said he still gets excited driving up the road to Brittany Hill.

“Looking at that castle, it’s like Disney World,” he said. “I was blown away. It’s so isolated. When we get a chance in the spring to put in great landscaping, it will really be awesome.”

Helen Richardson

Breckenridge Ski Area plans to begin construction of its Peak 6 expansion – 550 acres, two chairlifts and a patrol hut – in the spring. Peak 6 is visible on the right side of this photo.

The Forest Service has rejected an appeal of its August approval of Breckenridge’s plan to add 550 acres and two lifts on its Peak 6.

The October appeal – filed by several environmental groups that battled the expansion plan during five years of review – argued the ski area had failed to prove it needed the expansion and the project could disrupt the habitat of the endangered Canadian lynx.

The Forest Service reviewed the appeal and last week found the agency’s Environmental Impact Statement review of the project adequately addresses the environmental opposition’s concerns.

“They rejected our appeal on all our issues, which isn’t a big surprise,” said Rocky Smith, the longtime ski area watchdog who wrote the opposition’s appeal. “I don’t feel we got a fair review of our issues, which is all we asked for.”

Scott Armentrout, the appeal reviewing officer and forest supervisor for the Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre and Gunnison national forests, reviewed 15 different issues in the nearly 100-page appeal and found that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife’s Biological Opinion of the proposed expansion adequately addressed issues relating to the lynx and the final approval by White River National Forest Supervisor Scott Fitzwilliams did not violate any laws, regulations or policies.

Read Armentrout’s recommendation here.

Armentrout also found that Breckenridge Ski Resort adequately proved the need for the expansion.
Noting that Breckenridge regularly ranks as the first and second most visited ski area in the country, with an estimated 1.81 million annual visitors expected within the next decade, Armentrout concluded that Breckenridge “has experienced greater annual skier visit growth compared to both annual Colorado skier visits and annual Summit County skier visits.”

Smith said his group is discussing a lawsuit to block the project, which would likely be filed before construction begins on the expansion next spring.

Sir Richard’s Condom Co. of Boulder announced Thursday the delivery of 500,000 condoms to the Partners in Health warehouse in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

The KORE condoms will be made available for free at PIH clinics, including the Mirebalais National Teaching Hospital, built by PIH in collaboration with Haiti’s Ministry of Health. The hospital, scheduled to open in 2013, will emphasize women’s health and reproductive support.

Sir Richard’s chief executive Jim Moscou said the shipment arrived in Haiti on Sept. 11 but essentially had been sitting in customs because of delays and red tape until this week.

It is the first formal delivery of condoms by Sir Richard’s to a developing country. For every condom sold, Sir Richard’s has pledged to donate a condom to a developing country in an attempt to combat HIV, sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies.

Besides addressing a worldwide shortage of condoms, Moscou said Sir Richard’s has delivered a product and brand that is culturally relevant to Haitians in hopes of promoting usage. KORE — pronounced kor-ay — is a slang term that translates as “I have your back.”

“Knowing KORE has arrived and is now in the good hands of Partners in Health is an incredible moment for all of us at Sir Richard’s,” Moscou said. “We’ve taken the first step in accomplishing what we dared — to prove the power of business can be used to help promote global health.”

Moscou hinted that Sir Richard’s next donation would be even bigger. “We’re looking at seven figures,” he said, without disclosing the destination.

Sir Richard’s will begin launching its products in the United Kingdom the week of Dec. 9. They’ll be in Whole Foods Markets/London and other retailers by Jan. 1.

Added Moscou: “We’re up for a major design award there on Dec. 12 for best young company.”