May 23, 2013 Dear Chairwoman Sosnowski and members of the Environment Committee: This e-mail follows yesterday evening’s hearing on S-901, the Governor’s Energy Reform Act of 2013, with its provision for purchasing large quantities of Canadian hydropower; and S-938, Chairwoman Sosnowski’s proposal for extending and enlarging Rhode Island’s landmark Distributed Generation Standard Contracts program. For your reference, I attach a copy of the written submission that I provided at yesterday’s hearing, which you can see here. It was significant at yesterday’s (very long) hearing that – except for the Governor’s Administration – every witness from every sector spoke against the Governor’s energy bill. In broad terms, these witnesses came from four different sectors: (1) the utility (National Grid); (2) the environmental community (including the Environment Council of Rhode Island, Conservation read more…

This week on Talking Fish, Tom Toles responds to a new study on fisheries and climate change with a clever cartoon; in Fish Talk in the News, a top official is leaving NOAA, alewife counts are way up, and a parasite may be hurting yellowtail flounder populations. read more..

It is important to build bridges, but we need to make sure they get us where we need to go. The proposed expansion of the Vermont Gas pipeline may be more a minefield than a bridge, as one recent Vermont weekly  and one recent national energy blog reported. The project will cut through valuable wetlands and farmland in Addison County. Future plans include crossing Lake Champlain, moving Vermont closer to gas supplies from fracking that is ongoing now in New York and Pennsylvania. Proponents of the project, including Middlebury College and Vermont Gas advance an overly simplistic evaluation suggesting more natural gas is needed in Vermont because it is cheaper and cleaner than the oil and propane it will replace. Others suggest natural gas is a bridge to cleaner supplies that are read more…

Can the Vermont Public Service Board determine the meaning of its own orders? The answer would seem to be “Of Course!” But that is the question that Vermont Yankee’s owners are putting before the Vermont Supreme Court. In two orders the Vermont Public Service Board issued a strong rebuke to Entergy. The Board refused to amend its prior orders and confirmed that the conditions of Entergy’s permits remain intact. Those conditions include that Entergy will not operate Vermont Yankee past March 2012 without new approval from the Board. Entergy brought this appeal to challenge those orders. On Monday Conservation Law Foundation’s brief, filed jointly with New England Coalition and Vermont Public Interest Research Group challenged Entergy’s claims. Our brief noted: Rather than comply with the conditions … and Board orders read more…

Do you want to help shape the future of New England’s ocean and our coastal economy? New England leads the nation in regional ocean planning and now is the time for your thoughts on healthy oceans and coasts to be heard. A series of ten public meetings are being held in from late May through June to get your questions and ideas. Why should this matter to you? If you enjoy fishing, going to the beach, surfing, boating, or are interested in offshore renewable energy, these are all reasons to get involved in ocean use planning. Starting next Thursday in Portland, ME, then continuing on through all New England’s coastal states, members of the Northeast Regional Planning Body (convened pursuant to the National Ocean Policy – which President Obama signed in read more…

This week on Talking Fish, a new study in Nature shows how climate change is affecting fisheries; Saving Seafood got it wrong on the Lenfest Forage Fish Task Force's peer review; in Fish Talk in the News, alewives return to the St. Croix and industry members prepare for more Magnuson-Stevens Act reauthorization hearings. read more..

Each year contaminated food sickens 48 million Americans and causes 3,000 deaths.  As the recent federal sequester highlights, Americans depend on programs that inspect food to ensure a safe food supply.  Unfortunately for those who run small farms in New England, the costs of complying with the confusing jumble of federal and state food safety laws can be daunting. In Maine, nine towns — Brooksville, Sedgwick, Penobscot, Blue Hill, Trenton, Hope, Plymouth, Livermore and Appleton —have passed ordinances allowing food producers and processors to sell their goods directly to consumers without state or federal oversight, exempting them from licensing and inspection laws. These ordinances have created controversy and have landed at least one Maine farmer in court. The legal issue arises from the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution (Article I, Section 8, Clause read more…

On April 13, the Massachusetts Senate voted in favor of a $600 million per year transportation funding plan. But can that plan fund all of the challenges facing the Bay State’s transportation system? It’s a question many are asking, and few have the tools to answer. That’s why we built the Transportation Budget Calculator. Follow this link to see how short this funding falls in the face of the state’s overwhelming transportation needs. The plan that the Senate approved directs an average of $600 million per year to transportation. While the Senate bill is similar to the proposal previously approved by the House, it added roughly $100 million per year on average in revenue. This additional amount does not require raising any new taxes. Rather, the Senate bill redirects 2.5 read more…

With warming seas and ocean acidification putting unprecedented pressure on our already heavily fished, shipped, and polluted coastal areas, adding the extreme pressures of seismic testing and offshore oil drilling, which we keep hearing are supposed to be safe and foolproof, but never really are, seems like a foolhardy move. There are plenty of other options for developing offshore energy that will not put us at such high risk of horrible toxic spills and deadly-to-wildlife noise. We don’t want dead or deformed fish, whales, and dolphins in our ocean, and tar balls on beaches where our kids build sand castles. We have some of America’s most beautiful coastal areas and amazing ocean life here in New England, and we need to keep them that way. What can you do to read more…

My colleagues in CLF’s Rhode Island office have been doing some important work that deserves attention this legislative session. Two of their efforts stand out: opposing the governor’s attempt to create special legislation to import power from Hydro-Quebec, and opposing the Rhode Island House leadership’s attempt to create a state Commerce Department that would take over permitting functions from the Department of Environmental Management and Coastal Resources Management Council. You’ve likely read more here (or here, or here) about Hydro-Quebec. The company, which (unsurprisingly, given the name) produces power from large-scale hydroelectric dams located throughout the Canadian province of Quebec, has been making a strong push to sell this power to states throughout New England. Hydroelectric power might not be so bad on its own, but Hydro-Quebec has some serious issues. read more…