1. FOSSIL FUELS: Whether by river or rail, coal exporters hit
local opposition in the Northwest RAINIER, Ore. -- The grainy
photograph hanging on the wall of the Ol' Pastime Tavern here
recalls a time when lumber still defined the economy of the
Northwest. It was taken in 1924. The tavern -- at that time
still a hotel and saloon -- is perched in the foreground,
flanked by smaller clapboard buildings on either side. Railroad
tracks run down the main street amid piles of logs waiting for
the next train. Nine decades later, those tracks still cut
through the heart of town, passing the Ol' Pastime and a dozen
other Rainier businesses as they skirt the southern bank of the
Columbia River. Soon, they could put Rainier squarely in the
path of some 30 million annual tons of coal, mined from Montana
and Wyoming and bound for the Pacific and Asia.