Why does this current groundfish crisis seem so familiar? As the populations of New England’s cod, haddock and flounder have continued to decline, it’s not surprising that the number of fishing boats chasing them have declined. read more..

This week on TalkingFish.org, the NEFMC Science and Statistical committee may have crossed the line from science to policymaking while discussing catch limits for yellowtail flounder; catch up on what's happening in New England fisheries with the weekly Fish Talk in the News; and read Sean Cosgrove's proposal to NOAA for addressing consolidation in the fishing fleet. read more..

How does a community balance the potential costs of siting clean energy projects with the economic benefits they provide? What are the local economic realities of hosting distributed clean energy generation facilities and energy efficiency projects in a community? CLF Ventures explored these questions and others in a recent webinar we co-sponsored with the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC) and the Massachusetts Municipal Association’s (MMA) Massachusetts Municipal Energy Group. The first in a three-part series CLF Ventures is co-hosting this summer and fall, the August 15 webinar featured a presentation by James McGrath, Park and Open Space Program Manager for Pittsfield, a Massachusetts Green Community that has hosted several large-scale solar projects and implemented robust, community-wide energy efficiency programs. He spoke about how to initiate clean energy projects, the advantages of read more…

Wikipedia describes the Standells’ 1965 classic “Dirty Water” as “a mock paean to the city of Boston and its then-famously polluted Boston Harbor and Charles River.” Though fans of local sports teams have embraced the song that plays so often over stadium loud speakers, most people would agree that they’d rather not have their capitol city mockingly identified with “famously-polluted” waters. That’s especially true in these hot summer months when you want to be able to swim at a City beach, fish from an urban jetty, or paddle a local river without fear of contacting raw sewage and toxic algae scums. Nearly thirty years ago, CLF embarked on a clean water campaign to end Boston’s “Dirty Water” era. CLF lawsuits spurred significant public investments in cleanup of the Boston Harbor read more…

Many of you have been waiting for the next opportunity to voice your concern over the BU Biolab. Your time is coming – the state’s public comment process will begin soon, and the Patrick Administration needs to hear from you. The proponents of Boston University’s proposed National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories (NEIDL) – known as the BU Biolab – in the densely populated urban environmental justice community of Roxbury/ South End are in the process of submitting the risk analysis of their project for environmental review. Having failed at this twice before – in the view of the Massachusetts courts and the National Research Council, among others – this is the third time  the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and BU have attempted to adequately explain how the risks associated read more…

Next week, Vermonters will mark an anniversary many of us would rather forget.  It is hard to believe that a year has passed since the deluge of Tropical Storm Irene caused destructive flooding in much of the state.  Federal, state, and charitable organizations are still working to help the storms victims recover (the Vermont Irene Fund is one of the many ways you can help).  Yet as the process of recovery continues, it is important to take stock of the lessons we should learn from this disaster, and our response to it, because the overwhelming scientific evidence suggests that climate change may bring more such extreme weather to our state and region. At CLF, Lake Champlain Lakekeeper Louis Porter, has led the effort to learn the hard lessons taught by Irene’s read more…

There are seven rivers that drain into the Great Bay estuary, carrying freshwater runoff – as well as pollutants – from 52 communities including 10 in Maine. The Bellamy River, which flows into Little Bay, originates from Swains Lake in Barrington and flows east through the Bellamy Reservoir in Madbury and then through the City of Dover. Seacoast residents might be most familiar with the mouth of the Bellamy, which flows under the Scammell Bridge on Route 4. Even though I have been working in the Great Bay estuary for nearly twenty-five years, I had never actually been on the river. Last week, I finally got that chance and was amazed by the lack of development along the shoreline. Starting from Little Bay, we cruised all the way to the read more…

This week on TalkingFish.org: NMFS and the New England Fishery Management Council are pushed to take action on river herring this year; hear what's new in New England's fisheries in the weekly Fish Talk in the News. read more..

How’s the weather? That question is much easier to answer than it used to be. Back in the old days farmers didn’t have the Weather Channel or iPhone forecasts and could only rely on their own knowledge. Early forecasts of the weather improved because of balloons that were sent up into the atmosphere to gather information – today similar devices are sent up every 12 hours around the world. Combined with satellite and other data, accurate weather forecasts are now at our fingertips. A hundred years ago, it took months to produce inaccurate forecasts. For farmers, the ability to make plans on accurate weather predictions came down to dollars and sense – a torrential rain or early frost could destroy crops and carry a heavy economic cost. A big storm read more…

Hats off to Vermont regulators for requesting the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to put an end to the string of mishaps at the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant. Vermont Yankee is an aging nuclear plant on the banks of the Connecticut River. It is increasingly showing its age and the time for stepped up oversight is long overdue. The request cites incidents that “continue to pile up”, including:  “a misaligned valve in the pool where the plant stores highly radioactive spent fuel waste allowed 2,700 gallons of water to drain out of the pool. Another involved epoxy applied to a condenser to keep it from leaking; that interfered with the condenser’s operation and forced the plant to reduce its power output.” It is time for the NRC to step in and read more…