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 with placing a a high-level biocontainment laboratory that would test pathogens like ebola and the plague are acceptable for this community.

The latest Risk Assessment, which was recently completed by NIH, is now under final consideration by that same agency pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). CLF has reviewed the final Risk Assessment and, like NIH and BU’s past attempts, it still falls extremely short of addressing concerns about the lab raised by community members.

In particular, NIH’s final Risk Assessment  does not meaningfully address the fact that the Boston location selected for siting the NEIDL comes with substantially more risk potential than rural or suburban alternative sites. The final Risk Assessment also fails to fully analyze the ways in which the environmental justice community living near the NEIDL site, which already battles disproportionately compromised health, would be unfairly affected by proximity to the facility – which unfortunately has great potential for disaster in the event of an accident or malevolent attack. For a copy of the written comments submitted to NIH by CLF and its legal partners last Friday explaining why the latest Risk Assessment is still insufficient, click here.

BU will soon submit its Risk Assessment for review by the state pursuant to the Massachusetts Environmental Policy Act (MEPA), at which point the public will have the opportunity to comment. Public input is the heart of the environmental review process. It is essential that the Patrick administration hear why this facility presents too much risk, and not enough benefit, for this already overburdened environmental justice community. CLF will provide updated information here on how you can submit public comment as soon as those details become available. Check back here soon for how you can get involved!

Boston University (BU) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) are preparing a mandatory revised risk assessment for BU’s National Emerging Infectious Disease Laboratories (NEIDL), which has received substantial federal funding through NIH. I described the specifics of this risk assessment in an earlier post. The draft of that risk assessment is currently ready for public review. Though we reported in our last post that the public hearing for NIH’s draft risk assessment would be held February 16, that hearing was delayed by NIH. NIH recently announced that the hearing has been rescheduled for April 19 and that they are accepting public comments on the draft risk assessment. Your input in this public process is crucial – here is how you can get involved:

• Review the Draft Risk Assessment: The first step is to review what NIH has prepared. You can access the draft risk assessment electronically here, and the accompanying Reader’s Guide here. You can also obtain a hard copy of the draft risk assessment and Reader’s Guide in the mail by e-mailing NIH at NIH_BRP@od.nih.gov or calling (301) 496-9838 to place your request.

• Submit Written Comments: Any member of the public can submit comments to NIH on the draft assessment – that means you! The public comment period closes on May 1, 2012. After reviewing the draft risk assessment, submit your comments to NIH by May 1^st via email at NIH_BRP@od.nih.gov or in hard copy to: The National Institutes of Health, ATTN: NEIDL Risk Assessment, 6705 Rockledge Drive, Suite 750, Bethesda, MD 20892.

• Attend the Hearing: The public hearing on the draft risk assessment has been rescheduled for Thursday, April 19, 2012, from 6:30-9:30 PM at Roxbury Community College, 1234 Columbus Avenue, Boston, MA 02120. This is your opportunity to offer comments on the risk assessment verbally. We strongly encourage you to support the local community members opposing this project by attending this public hearing – either to offer comments yourself, or to offer support through your presence. If you would like to offer oral comments, you will need to sign-in prior to the start of the meeting. You can sign-in beginning at 5:30 PM.

Your written and oral comments can be as long/detailed or brief/big-picture as you like – there is no one way to express your opinion. The important thing is that you speak up.

Check the CLF Scoop for more updates or contact me at jrushlow@clf.org with any questions.

Courtesy of bradlee9119@flickr. Creative Commons.

The triple bottom line has become both a catch phrase and, increasingly, a realistic goal for everyone from investors to activists and urban developers. But in Massachusetts, aging MBTA trains and infrastructure coupled with proposed fare hikes and service cuts stand in the way of achieving the triple-bottom-line promise of Transit-Oriented Development (TOD).

TOD projects are generally comprised of mixed-use or mixed-income developments that are situated within a half-mile of a mass transit station. They provide residents with easy access to the places they want to go (jobs, doctors, movie theaters, etc.) and place businesses within reach of employees and consumers along the mass transit system.

One of the advantages of TOD projects is their potential to achieve triple-bottom-line returns, providing economic, environmental, and community benefits simultaneously. By encouraging people to use mass transit and rely less on automobiles, TOD projects help to reduce both noxious auto emissions and climate-altering greenhouse gases. In fact, people in highly walkable neighborhoods drive nearly 40% fewer miles than their counterparts in the least walkable neighborhoods, which can reduce traffic-related emissions by as much as 2,000 grams of CO₂ per person per day. Furthermore, the increased walking (at least 10 minutes daily on average) reduces the risk of obesity, regardless of age, income, or gender.

So TOD opens up new opportunities for growth without requiring the costly, carbon-intensive infrastructure needed for cars, and contributes to healthful, walkable neighborhoods that attract both businesses and residents. Sounds great, right?

Unfortunately, there’s a hitch. TOD projects rely on the assumption that the transit system is capable of supporting them. Here in Massachusetts, proposed MBTA fare increases and service cuts, as well as our aging transportation infrastructure, may prevent TOD projects from delivering on their promise. This is a bad thing for Massachusetts residents, for our economy, and for our environment.

The MBTA is old. After putting off badly needed maintenance on the Red Line for several years, an entire section has been shut down on weekends for emergency repairs, cutting off access for parts of Cambridge, Somerville, and beyond. And faced with a $161 million budget deficit, the T is now considering drastic fare increases and draconian service cuts, including potential elimination of over 100 bus routes as well as weekend service on the commuter rail and some subway lines.

The MBTA’s proposed fare increases and service cuts are unacceptable for MBTA riders and could prove disastrous for TOD projects, past, present, and future. Discouraging people from taking public transportation—either by eliminating MBTA service or making that service prohibitively expensive for riders—undermines the triple-bottom line goals of TOD. It may sound obvious, but TOD requires a healthy, functioning, financially accessible transit system to realize its full potential.

CLF is asking the state legislature and the governor to find a comprehensive solution to the MBTA’s funding problems, not just a band-aid for the coming year’s operating budget. And CLF Ventures is committed to finding triple-bottom-line solutions, like TOD, where profitable developments can also yield environmental and community benefits. Without continued investments in our transportation infrastructure in Massachusetts and a comprehensive solution to the T’s funding problems, TOD could become a triple-bottom loss for the economy, the environment, and for MBTA riders.

There is a saying that as goes Maine, so goes the nation. That is proving to be true, with one slight twist: As goes New England, so goes the nation’s environmental policy.

If you look at a wind map of the United States you’ll see that all prevailing winds east of the Mississippi eventually converge right here, in New England. That helps make New England the place so many of us love – warm summers, stunning falls, and cold, snowy winters – but it also makes New England the tailpipe of the nation.

Beginning in the mid-20^th century, researchers began documenting evidence of the effect of acid rain on Camel’s Hump in Vermont’s Green Mountains. They documented dramatic decreases in biomass, forest reproduction, seed germination, and other damaging effects among such species as red spruce, mountain maple, sugar maple, and beech – some of the trees whose brilliant fall colors draw millions of tourists to New England each fall. The cause? Acid rain.

Today, the problem continues, though in different ways. Antiquated coal plants built before 1970 have long enjoyed loopholes in the Clean Air Act that allowed them to emit toxic pollutants without modern controls. They have spewed a mix of mercury, arsenic, lead, and soot that harms all Americans by degrading our air and water quality, as well as our public health by increasing the rates of lung disease and causing asthma attacks, among other ailments. Even though many New England states have imposed modern controls on their plants, winds continue to carry pollution from the rest of the country that harms New England’s environment and its people.

That’s why today’s ruling from the EPA on the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) is so laudable. As my colleague Jonathan Peress said in a press statement, these standards “amount to one of the most significant public health and environmental measures in years.” They are also similar to standards we adopted here in New England years ago.

According to EPA estimates, these standards will prevent 11,000 heart attacks and 130,000 asthma attacks annually among Americans by 2016. The standards will also save at least $59 billion measured as a reduction in premature deaths, lower health care costs, and fewer absences from work or school. That is undoubtedly a good thing. It is also undoubtedly long overdue.

The affected coal plants are toxic dinosaurs. According to an AP survey, the average age of the plants is 51 years – some of them were even built when Harry S Truman was president. EPA’s new standards will finally allow the public health protections, signed into law by George H.W. Bush as a part of the Clean Air Act of 1990, to do their job. As Ilan Levin, associate director of Environmental Integrity Project, said in a piece on Climate Progress, “The only thing more shocking than the large amounts of toxic chemicals released into the air each year … is the fact that these emissions have been allowed for so many years.”

Here in New England, we have long understood the importance of controlling harmful pollution. CLF together with a close coalition pushed for strict state air pollution standards to clean up the dirtiest plants in Massachusetts. In 2001, the Department of Environmental Protection adopted regulations known as “The Filthy Five” that went beyond the Federal Clean Air Act of 1970, and tackled the issues of mercury and carbon dioxide. From our experience with stringent state standards in Massachusetts and Connecticut, we know the substantial benefits to public health and the environment that will result from these rules.

Concern that these standards will directly shut down plants is misguided. According to an AP survey, “not a single plant operator said the EPA rules were solely to blame for a closure.” Instead, a confluence of factors have already initiated a broad technology shift we’re already seeing here in New England: coal prices are rising and natural gas prices are declining against a background of strict state clean air rules. Given this, many (but not all) of New England’s plants have either already installed modern pollution controls, or are actively planning for retirement, in ways that will keep the lights on.

I applaud the EPA, and Administrator Jackson, for their good work on these standards. We will continue to support them, and they’ll need our help.

And in any event, how long are people to suffer while clean air requirements on the books go unenforced? 21 years (since 1990) is too long. The time has come. Finally.

It is difficult to describe the depths of disappointment inspired by  the decision of the President to order the withdrawal of the draft standards for “ground level ozone” – a pollutant that causes massive harm to the public health, causing special harm to the elderly and children.

The public health medical and advocacy communities have slammed this move – with good reason given the very real price in human health of this decision.

It is especially a regrettable decision for New Englanders. Up here in the tailpipe of America we deal with bad air created not just by local pollution but also real harm created by air pollution coming from power plants, factories and cars across the continent, particularly the Midwest.

And while this decision is bad enough the even more chilling possibility is that it might signal the beginning of a general retreat from the Obama Administration’s good efforts on air pollution – a record that, unsurprisingly, was on display the same day as this decision.

This decision marks out a need to continue to maintain pressure on the administration, Congress and to continue to work on the local, state and regional levels to reduce air pollution.  Our health, our environment and our economy will thank us for it.

As American dependence on foreign oil only grows stronger, high unemployment remains steady, and pollution continues to rise, the current state of domestic affairs seems bleak.  One bright spot, however, aims to address and make a serious dent in these national crises: the electric vehicle (EV).  So bright is the future of EVs that over 180 businesses, municipalities and public interest groups – including the CLF – have signed a statement of support to advance EVs in the U.S.

With the magnitude of national problems and the strong universal support for the EV solution, I set out, as a newbie to EVs, to understand what all the hype is about.

Edison with an electric car in 1913. (Photo credit: americanhistory.si.edu)

While long touted as environmentally friendly and in many aspects superior to fossil fueled vehicles, the EV remains little understood, especially to a novice like myself.  Typically, when I hear EV I think Toyota Prius or Honda Civic Hybrid, but as the name implies, these are hybrids of gasoline engines and rechargeable electric batteries.  An EV is different as it runs on 100% electric power, foregoing the need for gasoline, excessive emissions, and perhaps most importantly, excessive prices at the pump.  In fact, using the national average of $ 0.11/kwh, it costs a mere $ 2.75 to fill up an EV Nissan Leaf to travel 100 miles!  To travel 100 miles in my modest Subaru Impreza at my local gas station’s regular unleaded price of $ 3.72, it costs $ 16.90!

The Tesla Roadster, the industry's fastest production EV at 3.7 0-60 mph and 245 mi. range. (Photo credit: Tesla Motors)

But someone like myself may ask: Where do I charge up?  The answer is simple: At home!  While the infrastructure for public charging terminals is still under development, imagine if you could essentially have a fuel station at your home, open 24/7, and charging next to nothing rates.  Well no need to imagine, as home charging stations for EVs are the mainstay of the current EV fleet, with charging times ranging from 3 to 7 hours to charge a car from empty to full.  With prices ranging from $1000-$2200 installed, home charging stations can appear pricey.  But no need to fear the sticker, as you will easily make that cost back in a year, as my Subaru Impreza has an EPA estimated annual fuel cost of approximately $2,500, compared to the EV Nissan Leaf’s annual fuel cost of around $550!

Finally, for those of us who have a hard time conceptualizing a world where cars run on electricity, Nissan has an interesting ad that flips the perspective to a world where everything runs on gasoline; suffice it to say, you don’t want it.

What can the EV do for American job growth?  For starters, EVs have already been successful in jumpstarting job growth and placing the U.S. in a competitive position in the manufacture of EV components.  Within three years, more than 20 different EVs will be on the market, with EVs and their components being built in at least 20 states.  Furthermore, the future of EV infrastructure will provide countless job opportunities for Americans, which will not only strengthen our economy, but do so in an environmentally and economically sustainable way.

While cost savings and job growth are both attractive benefits to EVs, perhaps the greatest benefit is to environmental and public health.  The transportation sector is a significant cause of both global warming and air pollution, which affects everything from the global climate to those with sensitivity to air pollutants, such as asthmatics.  EVs have little or no tailpipe emissions, and even when power plant emissions are factored in, still have lower overall emissions of CO2 and other harmful pollutants, than traditional fuels.

Finally, where utilities provide clean energy options – natural gas, wind, solar, etc. – EVs could become truly zero emission vehicles, turning one of the America’s biggest environmental and public health problems into a solution for the world to follow.

As America faces some of the most difficult economic and environmental times in our nation’s history, the EV stands as a simple solution to tough problems.  It is not often that a decision can be made that saves you money, creates jobs and improves environmental quality.  The EV does all three.  The only thing standing in the way of success is ultimately the consumer, of which I will happily become one at the next chance I get, knowing that my EV will essentially pay for itself, while creating American jobs and saving the environment.

Editor’s note: Cory McKenna is a Cavers Legal Intern at CLF Maine. He is a student at the University of Maine School of Law.

Bike share programs are already fixtures in cities like Washington, D.C., above. (Photo credit: S. Diddy, flickr)

“Hubway,” Boston’s long-anticipated bike share program, is set to open this month. With 600 bikes at 61 stations around Boston (one a block away from CLF’s Boston office at the corner of Summer and Arch Streets!) and surrounding areas, Hubway will facilitate transportation around Boston by reducing crowds on the T and providing access to places that the T does not currently reach. Moreover, Hubway will contribute to fewer greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector– the largest single source of GHG emissions in the state– and create a more livable city with better transportation options to get people out of their cars and into their communities.

Already very successful in Europe, bike share programs are increasing in popularity in the U.S., and already exist in cities such as Minneapolis, Denver, and Washington, D.C. Many people in the Boston area are excited about the prospect of being able to grab a bike, go where they need to go, and return it at any station convenient to their destination. Operating three seasons a year (the system closes in the winter), Hubway offers 24-hour, 3-day, or annual memberships, allowing members access to all of the bikes and free rides under 30 minutes.

In anticipation of this program, Boston has been working hard to make the city more bicycle-friendly. In the past few years, 38 miles of bike lanes and 1,600 public parking spaces for bicycles have been built. However, there is still a lot of work to be done to prepare for this big change in how we use our roads. Currently, the Boston Police are getting ready for the influx of bicyclists. Focusing mostly at intersections known to have frequent crashes, Boston police officers are prepared to hand out tickets to drivers and bicyclists alike for disobeying traffic laws. The residents of Boston will have to learn to share the road regardless of whether they are biking or driving.

However, we at CLF believe that that’s a small price to pay for the myriad of benefits that Hubway will bring. The program will increase transportation choice and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while saving consumers money on gas and helping them get a little exercise while they’re at it, which will lead to public health benefits as well.

Learn more about CLF’s work to modernize transportation and build livable cities.

Editor’s note: Hannah Cabot is the summer 2011 communications intern at CLF Massachusetts. She is a rising senior at Milton Academy in Milton, MA.

 It’s July 4^th – as you head out to your favorite swimming spot, consider this…

While New England is home to many clean, scenic beaches, the sad truth is that hundreds of beach closures occurred in 2010 across the New England states.  Check out NRDC’s new report, Testing the Waters to see where your state ranked, and how clean your favorite beach was last year. (Spoiler alert: if you’re in Maine, Massachusetts, or Rhode Island, there’s room for improvement).

Why are these problems so pervasive?  Polluted stormwater runoff and sewage overflows are the major culprits – making beach closures more likely after it rains.  In Massachusetts, 79% percent of ocean beach standards violations happened within 24 hours after a rainstorm, according to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.  

The solutions are not cheap – to tackle this set of problems problem will require a sustained commitment to fixing and improving underground sewer pipes, enlarging wastewater treatment plants, and installing green stormwater treatment to capture and clean runoff from roads and parking lots.  

The cost of doing nothing is also significant.  The US EPA estimated that in one year, 86,000 people lost a chance to swim because of beach closures in areas affected by stormwater pollution.

Clean water is essential to a thriving New England.  That is why CLF is applying legal leverage to improve management of sewage and stormwater runoff across the region.  We’re working toward a day when the pollution that causes beach closures will be a thing of the past, and swimmers will have their pick of beautiful New England beaches – whether or not it’s recently rained.

Peter Shelley, CLF senior counsel. Photo credit: Evgenia Eliseeva

Twenty-eight years ago, we at CLF said we were going to take Boston Harbor back from the state polluters for the benefit of the children at the beach, the economic opportunities around a clean harbor and the future of Massachusetts. No one at CLF even suspected that this was to be a $4.5 billion, generational effort, let alone that billions more would be needed to rebuild metropolitan Boston’s water distribution system. Last week, the final major capital project from the original litigation to create that cleaner harbor was completed, producing feelings of great satisfaction as well as nostalgia. It was the light at the end of the tunnel that CLF entered on behalf of our members so long ago. Our supporters have been patient beyond recognition.

It is safe to say that it was worth the wait and the investment. Today, Boston Harbor is swimmable and fishable. Boston now has a world-class water and sewer authority and a new National Park celebrating the Boston Harbor Islands. Billions of dollars were invested in real estate, producing thousands of jobs around the harbor in the process, and Boston Harbor now also has its own watchdog—Save The Harbor/Save The Bay, a group CLF helped form to carry our vigilance forward. While CLF was just the point of the spear that made all this happen, there is no question that we were the point of that spear.

So many of the people who made this a success story are now gone. At the top of that list would have to be Massachusetts Superior Court Justice Paul G. Garrity and Federal Judge A. David Mazzone, neither of whom lived to see the final realization of their judicial efforts. Judge Garrity singlehandedly faced down the Massachusetts Legislature and refused to budge until they released their control of the sewer and water system by creating the Massachusetts Water Resource Authority (MWRA). In the process, he may have issued the only city-wide building ban in Boston history. Judge Mazzone was the harbor cleanup program. He loved this harbor and threw his keen intellect, his brilliant strategic skills and his wonderful sense of humor—not to mention a couple of unbelievably good law clerks—into the challenge that was thrown before his court. Also in that list has to be Sam Hoar, a long time friend of CLF’s who died in 2004. Sam selflessly volunteered himself and some of the best lawyers at Goodwin, Procter & Hoar to help CLF survive the relentless legal briefing of the early days.

Among those who have moved on to other things are Doug Foy, Paul Levy, Doug MacDonald and Dick Fox. Doug Foy is gone only in the sense that he is no longer CEO of CLF. He needs no special introduction to the CLF family. His vision never faltered when he had made up his mind that something had to happen with Boston Harbor. Paul Levy and Doug MacDonald both performed project management miracles to bring one of the biggest and most complicated public works projects in Massachusetts history online both on schedule and on budget.  They, of course, were just the tip of the iceberg of the extraordinary staff at the MWRA. As for Dick Fox, lead engineer for CDM, the project design and construction lead, I’ll never forget the moment in open court when Judge Mazzone leaned his long frame forward, fixed Dick Fox in his eyes and said: “I’m going to hold you to your promises here.” Dick not only didn’t flinch; he responded “I expect you to.” This may have been a court-supervised cleanup, but make no mistake—it was a cleanup that happened because of the personal integrity commitment of lots of folks like Dick Fox.

Great credit also has to be extended to Diane Dumanowski, one of the finest reporters ever at the Boston Globe and one of the best environmental reporters in the country. Her series in the Globe on the collapse of the Metropolitan District Commission sewerage system, backed up by strong editorials from Globe columnist Ian Menzies, was the spark that ignited Doug Foy into action. Finally, no story about the Boston Harbor cleanup would be complete without mentioning Bill Golden, then solicitor for the City of Quincy, whose fateful jog on the feces-strewn Wollaston Beach in 1982 made him mad as hell and got the whole ball rolling.

CLF is not done with Boston Harbor, however. All the tributaries coming into Boston Harbor still suffer from significant pollution discharges from multiple public and private sources. These discharges expose Massachusetts residents to disease, damage the environment, and frustrate new economic opportunities. With the same energy we brought to the battle for Boston Harbor, we are hard at work fighting those upstream pollution sources with a terrific coalition of community groups and partner conservation non-profits. We look forward to similar moments of great accomplishment and satisfaction in the future when we can finally say that this great harbor’s entire watershed has a clean bill of health.