Richmond CCANers recruit for Energize Va!

Changing over to new energy sources like offshore wind requires trying some new tactics! In Richmond this week, CCANers got together at a local ale house, but it wasn’t just your usual happy hour.

Richmond Climate Happy Hour met this week and used a new strategy to spread the word about Richmond’s upcoming offshore wind conference Energize Virginia. On a spacious outdoor patio, the team took advantage of the modern cell phone age to conduct a “Lightning Phonebank”. The group whipped out their cell phones and called dozens of local supporters and friends, and invited them to the first-ever grassroots conference on offshore wind in the commonwealth. The atmosphere was fun and relaxed, but with a purpose: to get folks to come out and get down to business to bring an offshore wind farm to Virginia.

Here’s the next step in our recruitment experiment, and it depends on you! Register now online to attend Energize Virginia in Richmond on Saturday, June 4th

Maryland Judge Gives Mixed Ruling in Coal Plant Suit Brought by CCAN and EIP

Washington County Circuit Court Judge Sets Good Precedent Concerning Citizens’ Right to Appeal but Drops the Ball on Pollution Permit for R. Paul Smith Power Plant

On April 21st, 2011, Judge W Kennedy Boone, a lower state court judge in Washington County, Maryland, rendered his decision in a case brought by the Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) and the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP). The case focused on Allegheny Energy’s water pollution permit related to the R. Paul Smith power plant in Williamsport, MD. Continue reading

McDonnell's got wrong answers

The Richmond Times-Dispatch

In the face of high gas prices, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell is right to say the commonwealth needs new offshore energy to power its ever-thirsty cars (May 5 Op/Ed, “America’s energy insecurity”). The only problem is McDonnell is talking about the wrong kind of energy for the wrong kind of cars. Pushing for dangerous offshore drilling just a few miles from Virginia Beach in 2011 is the technological equivalent of building canals during the early days of railroad. Or investing in manual typewriters in, say, 1985.

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Permit Meetings: Wonky but Important

I’ve been on the road the past few weeks in some beautiful parts of Maryland! GenOn, the corporate owners of the Morgantown (in Newburg, MD) and Dickerson (in Dickerson, MD) coal plants, has applied for modifications of their existing water permits, and I attended the first of the public informational meetings.

The meetings are a bit intimidating at first, I kept flashing back to chemistry classes in high school. There are a lot of numbers and discussion of point sources and data collection. But the point of these hearings isn’t to understand every detail.

At the end of the day these plants are in the backyards of communities, so it is important for citizens to have a say in the process and know what Gen On is applying to do to the nearby waterways. If there weren’t public hearings like these, permits would get approved with no one asking critical questions and without community members being able to hold Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) and GenOn accountable.

I was so impressed with the questions local citizens asked in the room, and the commitment they had by showing up to these meetings on weeknights. More folks need to be involved in these issues and MDE should make it easier for them. The meetings should be advertised widely to all the local groups, list servs, and neighborhoods and the meeting space and time should be as convenient as possible for that community.

Until then I’ll be doing my best to make sure folks know about upcoming hearings. I’ll be there as well, my lack of chemistry understanding be damned, because I care about making these permits as strong as possible for the health of Maryland’s communities and environment.

Huge environmental presence at Dominion's annual shareholder meeting

This morning, I was one of about a dozen environmental advocates to attend Dominion Resources Inc.’s annual shareholder meeting in Charlottesville, VA, while about 30 others rallied outside. Between shareholder proposals, comments and questions by shareholders and their proxies and the company’s own presentations, reducing the company’s impact on the environment was discussed at least as much as its financial performance. And the meeting left me hopeful that environmental advocates can work with Dominion to increase its investment in renewables, especially offshore wind power.

Just this Tuesday, we publicly launched our joint campaign with the Sierra Club Virginia Chapter, Green Jobs Alliance and Virginia Interfaith Power & Light asking Dominion to work with us to invest in offshore wind power. So today I spoke at the shareholder meeting in support of a proposal for the company to set and pursue a goal of 20% renewable energy generation by 2024. Specifically, I spoke about the fact that while offshore wind power does require a greater investment up front, it carries fewer long-term financial risks than investing in fossil fuel power plants. The risks of building new fossil fuel generation include:

    –volatile prices for coal and natural gas that are set by an increasingly global market
    –the potential need for pollution control upgrades in order to comply with future environmental laws
    –and the risk of accidental releases, like the catastrophic spill of coal-ash that Tennessee Valley Authority had in 2008, which could cost millions in clean up expenses, not to mention the public relations fall-out.

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Dominion: It's Time for Virginia Offshore Wind

On Tuesday morning, CCAN’s Virginia team and members of the newly created VA4Wind coalition came together to formally announce our campaign to bring offshore wind energy to Virginia. Because Dominion Virginia Power is the commonwealth’s largest electric utility, the coalition is calling on the company to develop a large-scale offshore wind energy project off of Virginia’s coast. We hope to compel Dominion to include offshore wind in its September 2011 Integrated Resources Plan (IRP).

VA4Wind
VA4Wind

At the event, VA4Wind leaders touted the plentiful benefits of offshore wind energy and the opportunities it provides for the commonwealth, including the addition of thousands of new jobs and a new revenue source for Virginia’s economy, cleaner air and water, and stable long-term energy prices. With plentiful offshore winds, a deepwater port and a skilled and experienced labor force, Virginia could easily be the east coast capital for America’s new offshore wind industry.

In just a matter of weeks, VA4Wind has already collected more than 3,000 signatures from Virginians who want to see Dominion take concrete steps towards developing offshore wind power. In addition, more than 60 Virginia businesses and organizations have already pledged their support for offshore wind energy.

Sign the petition today, and if you own a business or non-profit, please add your business’ name to our platform sign-on letter here. Continue reading

Maryland to Sue Gas Company Over Fracking Spill

It seems the news just keeps getting worse these days for those in the Marcellus Shale gas-fracking business. First there was the damning new Cornell University study which revealed the worse-than-coal climate impacts of the natural gas drilling procedure. Then, the Chesapeake Energy Corporation experienced the mother of all bad press days when one of its Pennsylvania wells experienced a massive blowout, spewing thousands of gallons of frack fluid into a nearby stream. In a poetic touch, the blow-out occurred on the one-year anniversary of the gulf oil spill.

While nowhere near the scale of the BP blowout, the Chesapeake Energy frack-up certainly echoed the massive gulf disaster in terms of the outrageous incompetence and recklessness of the well’s owners.

According to a Pro-Publica article it took the company a full 13 hours to respond to the accident. The reason for the egregious delay: despite widespread fracking activity in the Pennsylvania Marcellus Shale, the state did not have a single team of specially trained fracking accident responders, and instead had to fly in workers from Texas. In the end, thanks to the holdup, it took no less than two days from the time of the accident before workers managed to cap the spill. Continue reading

Supreme Court: Is global warming a public nuisance?

The United States Supreme Court is hearing oral argument today in the case of AEP, et al vs. Connecticut, et al. This case was brought three years ago by eight states, New York City and three different land trusts against five major power producers in the Midwest and East Coast. The claim was that by operating coal-fired power plants, and emitting dangerous greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, these companies were creating a public nuisance that states must address with state resources. Therefore, to remedy this public nuisance, these companies would have to comply with a court ordered mandate to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from these facilities by certain percentages over the next 10 years. Effectively, a cap on carbon dioxide from coal-fired power plants established by the courts, not Congress or EPA.

The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals found for the states in this case. The power companies appealed to the US Supreme Court and the high court granted the appeal last summer. Because Justice Sotomayor was on the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals when the case was heard, she has recused herself from the case. I don’t think that the high court will find for the states in this case, because they think that the EPA and/or Congress