Author

Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main
Visual journalist Jerry Redfern covers the environmental and humanitarian issues across Southeast Asia and other developing regions, as well as at home in the US. His work ranges from the aftermath of American bombs in Laos to agroforestry in Belize to life amid logging in Borneo. Jerry’s photos have appeared in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and Der Spiegel, among others. He has contributed to four book projects, including Eternal Harvest: The Legacy of American Bombs in Laos (co-authored with Karen Coates), which was a finalist for the IRE Book Award.
New Mexico oil and gas rules await cash after Democratic sweep
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - November 11, 2022
Despite a Democratic sweep of New Mexico state offices and continuing blue majority in the upcoming Legislature, the future of oil and gas regulation remains hazy. Michelle Lujan Grisham returns to the Governor’s Mansion for another four years, after a first term spent initiating some of the nation’s most progressive clean energy incentives and most stringent […]
Fossil fuel money flows to New Mexico Democrats
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - November 11, 2022
New Mexico’s Republicans and advocates for oil and gas producers often accuse the state’s ruling Democrats of trying to kill the local fossil fuel industry, but industry donations and agency funding outcomes tell a different story. Democrats hold a lock on all statewide offices and both chambers of the Legislature heading into the midterm elections, […]
A Republican attack ad gets its facts all wrong
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - October 26, 2022
The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) released a dozen negative ads on Oct. 11, none of which say anything about Republican members of Congress or their platforms. Instead, this 11th-hour mudslinging focuses on attacking Democrats — often without basis. And in the case of its smear of Gabe Vasquez, the Democratic challenger in New Mexico’s District 2, the NRCC […]
‘Strongest climate bill ever’ may increase oil and gas production in New Mexico
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - October 19, 2022
While President Joe Biden’s $737 billion Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) aims to address a cornucopia of American ills, arguably its most important aspect is how it jump-starts the country’s fight against climate change. It attacks the country’s carbon emissions from both ends — consumption and production — with one primary tool: money. A lot of money: […]
A petroleum PR blitz in New Mexico
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - September 27, 2022
In the past seven months, oil and gas companies have dramatically stepped up their outreach and public relations spending at some of New Mexico’s best-known, best-loved events. The industry also picked up an additional public relations bump from the not unexpected news that oil and gas revenues will add an additional $2.5 billion to next year’s state […]
As EPA fails to fine oil and gas polluters, New Mexico officials demand answers
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - September 14, 2022
New Mexico officials are asking the federal government to explain why it decided not to impose fines on oil and gas producers it caught violating the Clean Air Act in the state. In May, Capital & Main reported that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) found that 24 companies had 111 leaks from wells and other equipment, following an […]
New Mexico’s pandemic oil and gas plan aided a Putin pal and Trump donor
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - August 15, 2022
Back in 2020, as oil and gas prices tanked because of the COVID crisis, New Mexico implemented an emergency program that would allow oil and gas producers to temporarily stop production and shut down wells for up to three years without penalty. The state’s Oil Conservation Division created the program so that companies could bank […]
New Mexico’s oil and gas revenues are breaking records and complicating budgets
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - July 15, 2022
Oil and gas revenues added more than $1.7 billion to New Mexico coffers in the first four months of the year — more than in any other four-month period in state history. A lot more. Records compiled by the New Mexico Tax and Revenue Department show that year-on-year, revenues from January through April more than doubled […]
Uncontrolled Burning: The role of oil and gas in New Mexico’s historic wildfires
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - July 12, 2022
On June 21, U.S. Forest Service Chief Randy Moore somewhat surprisingly laid the blame for the largest wildfire in New Mexico history squarely at the feet of his own agency: Using outdated information and practices, his employees started a prescribed burn that raced out of control. His admission came in the introduction to an 85-page Forest Service […]
Why won’t the EPA fine New Mexico’s greenhouse gas leakers?
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - May 31, 2022
In the fall of 2019, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) hired a helicopter equipped with a leak-detecting infrared camera to criss-cross the Permian Basin looking for gaseous emissions, part of a monitoring program undertaken at the behest of and in partnership with the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED). Over the course of nine days, the EPA […]
New Mexico county to ease oil and gas drilling rules despite new evidence of health dangers
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - May 26, 2022
A mapping project released today by nonprofit environmental groups EarthWorks and FracTracker shows that more than 12.3 million people live within a half-mile of an oil and gas facility in the United States — 144,377 of them in New Mexico. And earlier this month, a mostly rural county just south of Albuquerque passed an ordinance that could […]
Don’t look away: Dr. Peter Kalmus on the United Nations’ latest climate report
By: Jerry Redfern, Capital & Main - April 15, 2022
Dr. Peter Kalmus looks like a taller, fitter version of Leonardo DiCaprio’s character, Dr. Randall Mindy, in Netflix’s Don’t Look Up, last year’s climate change movie masquerading as a comet-cataclysm movie. Like DiCaprio’s character in the film written and directed by Adam McKay, Kalmus is also a scientist warning humanity of an impending global calamity, to little […]