Category: Environmental

Stars Disappear in Massachusetts Without Legislation

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In 2001, even with Boston only 40 miles to the north, the southeastern Massachusetts towns of Plympton, Plymouth, and Middleborough were dark and remote compared to surrounding towns. Carolyn and Barry DeCristofano moved to the area primarily for this reason. According to the Boston Globe, when it started getting brighter, they wanted to do something about the light pollution. Their efforts started with educating their neighbors and they led the charge to get a dark skies ordinance adopted in their town.

Light pollution occurs when humans introduce an excessive amount of artificial light into the environment. Areas that were once dark in Massachusetts are now being replaced with brightly-lit parking lots and street lights. This can cause a disastrous effect for both humans and other animals. For humans, it obscures the view of stars, disrupts sleep, and can cause safety hazards for drivers. This past August, NPR even discussed light pollution in Light Pollution and ‘The End Of Night.’

Kelly Beaty, member of the board of directors of the International Dark-Sky Association, and chairman of the New England Light Pollution Advisory Group, says that light directed at the ground does not waste energy since it is only directed where it is needed. When half the light is above the horizon, it hits people directly in the eye as well as contributes to light pollution. Beaty has been active in a 20-year effort to pass a state law regulating outdoor lighting.

In 2003, Plympton residents voted to pass a lighting bylaw that requires commercial and municipal lighting to have full cut-off fixtures and shields that direct light towards the ground. Regulations similar to this were already in place in nearby Plymouth and Norwell. The New England Light Pollution Advisory Group says that more than 40 communities in the commonwealth have instituted dark skies bylaws since 2000, while many others are heading in that direction.

In Chelmsford, a developer building a retail center installed LED fixtures with a soft glow and lower color temperature. LED lighting with a low Kelvin temperature is easier on the eyes, inexpensive, and more efficient than blue lighting. Higher Kelvin temperatures, which produce a harsh blue light, are criticized for disrupting circadian rhythms in both humans and animals. The initial price of LED may be higher, but it’s offset by the energy savings and lower maintenance costs since many are rated for up to 100,000 hours of use.

In urban areas, the stars have already disappeared. Without legislation, many believe that night skies—even in the most remote areas of Massachusetts—will continue to disappear due to light pollution.

 

Amazon Announces 100 Percent Renewable Energy Initiative

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In recent years, big corporations such as Facebook, Google, and Apple have all made the push toward renewable energy. Despite these companies’ moves to more green sources for energy, Amazon failed to follow suit. On Wednesday, November 19, 2014, they finally changed their tune.

Amazon Web Services was updated on Wednesday with information pertaining to the company’s vision of making a complete transition to renewable energy. Because Amazon is a massive entity and key player in cloud computing, supplying services to companies such as Pinterest, Spotify, and Netflix, there’s no doubt that the global environment will benefit from this move. At this point, however, there isn’t much cause for celebration. Because Amazon is an intricate entity, it will likely take several years for its transition to 100% renewable energy to complete.

Gary Cook, a Greenpeace IT analyst, was one of the first to notice that Amazon has still failed to publish a timeline or roadmap that indicates a plan for its renewable energy transition. This has caused heavy speculation about whether or not Amazon is serious about the move.

There’s no doubt that the company’s decision to move towards green processes is a good one. For years, Greenpeace criticized Amazon for not following suit in making a transition to healthier practices. As a result, in their “Clicking Clean” report released last April, Amazon was regarded as one of the worst companies on the map.

At this point, Amazon’s data centers are located primarily in Virginia and are powered by coal, natural gas, and nuclear power. However, certain data centers built since 2011 claim to run off of 100% renewable energy sources.

Cook was quick to note that one of Amazon’s biggest pitfalls is its failure to be honest and outspoken about the energy sources it uses. Cook believes that if Amazon is sincere about taking a significant step towards green energy sources, the company will become much more transparent over the next few years.

Final Weeks for Governor Patrick to be Marked by Wind Energy Auction

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Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick is not resting on his laurels for his final weeks in the corner office. On the contrary, he is advocating for a large auction for offshore wind development.

Patrick has reportedly told public relations executive Helene Solomon that the federal government would be auctioning off a substantial area south of Martha’s Vineyard. Once developed, this location could potentially provide power to as much as 60 percent of Massachusetts homes.

Along with federal officials Sally Jewell and Walter Cruickshank, Secretary of the Interor and Acting Director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, respectively, Patrick announced in June that there will be approximately 742,000 acres off the shore of Massachusetts that could be up for lease for commercial wind energy use. This is expected to be one of the largest offshore wind projects in federal waters.

Massachusetts Environmental Affairs Secretary Maeve Vallely Bartlett has recommended that the federal agency lower the minimum bid from $2.00 per acre of the tract to just $1.00 because these areas are quite large and quite deep, which could be a deterrent to developers. She has also recommended other cost savings, such as lowered rent and fees for operating the site.

Support of wind energy projects such as this one is not new for Patrick, who also supported the Cape Wind energy project that was planned for an area in the waters of Nantucket Sound. Unfortunately, that project, while still ongoing, still faces opposition and has not gained much traction.

Clark University Receives $542K in NASA Grants

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Clark University will receive $542,098 in grants from the National Atmospheric and Space Administration (NASA) to explore the carbon uptake and release in forests across the United States. The recipient is Christopher A. Williams, an associate professor in Clark’s Graduate School of Geography.

Williams is the head of a research team that received a previous grant from NASA’s Carbon Monitoring System (CSM) to study how much carbon U.S. forests release and absorb.  The team will use new remote-sensing products to document these carbon exchanges.

Williams is working with another research team that received a previous NASA grant to study forests in the Southeast U.S. Clark reported that this team is studying forest dynamics and will issue the information from the study to be used along with data collected from agricultural, transportation and energy sectors.

The CSM study will use the new remote-sensing products to study forest carbon absorption and release across the U.S. on regional and national levels. This study will use a reporting framework to forecast the carbon balance in forests after experiencing destructive scenarios, like forest fires and logging.

These studies help to determine how much carbon a forest releases into the atmosphere. Williams explained that when harvested or burned, the carbon a forest releases oxidizes with air and turns into carbon dioxide, a contributor to global warming. According to Clark, the clearing of forests has released about one-third of the carbon emissions caused by humans, with two-thirds resulting from the combustion of fossil fuels.

New Massachusetts Energy Chief Says State Can’t Rest in Push for Renewable Energy

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Bespectacled Maeve Bartlett stood behind a glossy black podium at the DCU Center and made a bold claim: The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is, she said, the national leader in meeting the challenges of climate change and adopting renewable energy technologies. Numero uno. The criteria: megawatts.

In 2007, Massachusetts had 3 megawatts of solar capacity and 3 megawatts of wind capacity. Operating at full power, these renewable energy plants could power 3,000-5,000 modern homes – small peanuts in a state with 6.7 million people.

But then Governor Deval Patrick and his administration passed three clean energy laws: the Green Jobs Act, the Green Communities Act, and the Global Warming Solutions Act. Businesses came a-dashing. Today, the state boasts 643 megawatts of solar capacity and 103 megawatts of wind capacity, and in 2014, Clean Edge ranked Massachusetts the leading state for clean energy policy and eco-energy investments per capita.

Barlett, formerly the agency undersecretary, was recently appointed to lead the final seven-month charge as head of the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs. She hopes to implement such plans like the Cape Wind project, secure hydroelectric contracts and construct more than 300 urban parks.

During her speech at the DCU Center as part of the eighth annual Massachusetts Energy Summit, Barlett said that the state could not rest in its push for renewable energy. The state hopes to eventually secure 30 percent of its power from clean energy sources.

Such grandiose plans represent big bucks. The Massachusetts clean energy sector is a $10 billion industry, with employment expected to surpass 100,000 jobs in early 2015. The sector has seen double-digit job growth for three consecutive years. At the recent Clean Energy Annual Jobs Report, Governor Patrick reported, “We have long believed that a strong commitment to investing in clean energy would not only provide significant environmental benefits, but would also serve as an economic catalyst in the Commonwealth.”

It is for megawatts – and megajobs – that Massachusetts is “taking the first, crucial steps to leaving a cleaner and more secure energy future,” said Bartlett, “for the next generation.”

ACEEE: Massachusetts Tops California as Most Energy-Efficient State

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Recently, the American Council of Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) released the eighth edition of the State Energy Efficiency Scorecard. The scorecard ranks the states based on various energy-efficient metrics such as how much electricity and fuel they use and their overall carbon footprint. In 2014, Massachusetts achieved the highest score for the fourth year in a row.

Today, states are implementing many different energy efficient tactics and programs. In fact, the number of state energy efficiency programs has tripled since the first ACEEE scorecard was introduced eight years ago, with many states using new energy-efficient initiatives to promote in-state jobs.

According the scorecard, the top states for energy efficiency are Massachusetts (42/50), California  (40.5/50), and with three states – Vermont, Oregon, and Rhode Island – tied for third place at 37.5 out of 50 possible points.

The top two states are certainly no surprise.  In recent years, Massachusetts has been earning the top slot on the scorecard for years and California is consistently found close to the top. Looking a bit deeper, Rhode Island, which tied for third, joined the top five for the first time. This is a testament to the improvements the state has been making in its own initiatives to improve its score.

States at the top of the list have each invested in energy efficiency programs that help spread awareness and implement utility, transportation, building, and government policies that encourage energy efficiency. In turn, these policies work to reduce energy costs and greenhouse gases that scientists say contribute to global warming.

Just this past summer, the town of Newton replaced 8,406 high-pressure sodium street lights with LEDs, a project made possible by a $250,000 grant from the Green Communities Act and $500,000 in rebates from NSTAR.  Massachusetts-based businesses are also leading the way, fostering our nation’s energy-efficient habits. Access Fixtures, a lighting company based in Worcester is one of the many contributors to the Commonwealth’s high score. Their lighting specialists encourage their customers to use LED lighting that uses a mere fraction of the energy compared to other light sources.

According to Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, “Energy efficiency is the cheapest and cleanest energy resource.” The governor stated that 65,000 in-state jobs have been created by energy-efficient incentives. He believes that the Commonwealth can have a clean-energy future along with robust economic growth. The two need not be mutually exclusive.Maggie Molina, Director of ACEEE’s Utilities, State, and Local Policy program, said: “Energy efficiency is also good for business. State action on energy efficiency improves bottom lines, drives investment across all sectors of the economy, creates jobs, and offsets the environmental harms created by the energy production system.”

Improvements to South Station Could Boost Framingham/Worcester Rail

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According to Massachusetts Transportation Secretary Richard Davey, Boston’s South Station is “becoming a choke point in the system and an obstacle to expanded service.” Davey placed a request with lawmakers on October 9 asking them for help with negotiating a deal that has the potential to allow the expansion of South Station.

Before the MBTA can add an additional seven tracks to the existing 13, it must first purchase property owned by the U.S. Postal Service. This piece of land has been the topic of discussions for years. The property is critical for the expansion of the station in its efforts to provide prompt service to commuters traveling through South Station.

The U.S. Postal Service and South Station “have yet to strike a deal,” said Davey, who will be leaving his post as transportation secretary at the end of October. He has asked Transportation Committee chairmen Sen. Thomas McGee (D-Lynn) and Rep. William Straus (D-Mattapoisett) for assistance with coming to an agreement. Davey also mentioned that the office is interested in purchasing property that once belonged to the Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital. This purchase would enable the expansion of the North Station rail lines with two new tracks and a center platform.

Following the signing of a transportation bond bill in April, the Patrick administration re-engaged with the Postal Service, offering to build a $350 million mailing facility in the Boston Seaport District. “Frankly, we’re a little stuck,” Davey admits. “We’ve made a number of different proposals that we thought were compelling, that made the Post Office whole.”

The Postal Service has expressed concerns that the new Seaport land would depreciate, resulting in a lower price if it should attempt to sell the property in the future.

Ebola and the Economy

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Unless you’ve been under quarantine for the past few weeks, you know that Ebola has once again reared its ugly head, causing widespread concern – bordering on panic in some quarters – about the possibility of a global pandemic. How realistic a possibility is this?  Could it actually happen? Frankly, it’s still too early to say one way or the other. However, it’s not too soon to make some basic predictions about how some businesses will be affected should matters get much worse.

Dr. Bruce Aylward is the Assistant Director General for the World Health Organization (WHO). He recently announced that organization’s prediction that the number of cases is expected to top 9000 by the end of this week, and the fatality rate of the current outbreak has risen from just under 50% to over 70%. When asked how the situation might evolve over the next 60 days, he warned: “We anticipate the number of cases occurring per week by that time to be somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 per week.”

As in previous instances of global health scares, airlines, theaters, sports arenas, and other locations where large “fraternities of strangers” gather are sure to be the first to suffer the economic consequences of a population frightened into isolation. Participating in purely recreational activities will be weighed against the fear of contagion, and attendance is sure to plummet.  Schools, churches, and other venues where attendance is “less voluntary” will follow suit in very short order if the outbreak is not quickly reigned in.

The WHO announced yesterday that the Ebola epidemic had officially been halted in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country.  Sadly, Liberia, Sierra Leone, and other nations in the region remain mired in the misery of a highly-contagious, incurable, deadly viral outbreak, and new cases are popping up around the globe on a daily basis.  Should this situation continue, the global economy is sure to take a big hit.

From a business perspective, this could cause a loss of billions of dollars in revenue. On a more personal level, this could very likely fundamentally change the way we socialize. How big a change depends entirely on how long this outbreak takes to be subdued and how much damage it does in the meantime.

TGP Northeast Energy Direct Pipeline – Will it Help or Harm?

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There’s a proposal in place to build a high-pressure natural gas pipeline to run from Pennsylvania through New York state into Massachusetts, where it would join with existing pipelines that connect to the Massachusetts and Canadian coasts. This controversial pipeline is intended to carry natural gas from the Marcellus (and perhaps Utica) Shale field. The voices on both sides of the issue are getting louder – and more contentious – every day.

While no one disputes the need for inexpensive energy, proponents tout job creation and lower energy prices as reasons to approve the pipeline’s construction, while opponents cite both the source of the natural gas itself and the anticipated disruption the construction will cause as reason enough to stop the project. They also dispute the number of jobs the project will create in the long term, some saying the number will actually be in the single digits.

Proponents say that the gas is needed to supply a region where energy prices are already at a premium, thereby substantially lowering consumer costs. Detractors say that an equivalent savings in efficiency could be realized by simply fixing the many leaks in the existing pipeline network. They also say that the pipeline will deliver far more gas than can be used in the region for the foreseeable future, requiring further shipment of overflow supply to other locations.

Proponents say that the pipeline will be built safely, ensuring the environment is protected. Detractors point out that the project has already been made exempt from its legal obligations to follow either state or local environmental laws or restrictions and can simply take whatever land they want – including protected and environmentally-sensitive areas – by eminent domain, and that the company’s past performance does nothing to instill confidence that laws will be respected.

What is the best course? Do we build a pipeline or not?

Should Cape Wind Receive $150 million Federal Loan Guarantee?

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The U.S. Department of Energy has announced that it will grant a $150 million loan to advance the Cape Wind energy project in Massachusetts, provided backers can secure an additional $2.6 billion in financing. If successfully built, Cape Wind will consist of 130 wind turbines capable of producing 360 megawatts of electrical power.

The project has been controversial since its inception. Cape Wind has been praised by supporters as having the potential to transform Eastern Massachusetts into a national hub for wind power production. Backers say that Cape Wind is a model for wind projects being considered in other parts of the country. Wind power is often cited as a key component of “clean energy” alternatives to fossil fuels, and is praised for producing very little pollution while being endlessly renewable. Greater use of wind power would reduce reliance on fossil fuels, while construction of the wind turbines is estimated to create about 400 jobs. An additional 50 permanent operational jobs will be created once construction is completed.

Not everyone is impressed. Critics point out that the number of jobs divided by the money spent means that each job will be created at a cost of over $300,000 apiece. Some suggest that is too much money for too few jobs. Critics also point out that even with government subsidies, wind energy is more expensive to produce than more traditional energy sources. Fisherman have complained that the wind turbines will upset their fishing opportunities by restricting access to areas that are now available for fishing. Meanwhile, free market conservatives argue that the project represents a potentially disruptive intrusion into the energy market that will have unintended consequences.

Despite the offer of the Energy Department money, it remains to be seen whether the rest of the $2.6 billion in financing will come together in order to trigger the $150 million loan, although European investors recently came forward with an offer of $600 million. However, political, regulatory, financial and environmental hurdles remain, leaving it still uncertain whether supporters or critics of the project will ultimately prevail.