EnviroPolitics Blog

No surprise here. NJ’s largest newspaper — and three others– announce they are going out of print but keeping online operations

By Frank Brill, EnviroPolitics Editor

The (Newark) Star-Ledger and two sister dailies, the Times of Trenton and South Jersey Times, will cease publishing print editions in 2025 but continue to invest in their online news operations. The separately owned Jersey Journal also will shutter its print editions due to the resulting loss of the Ledger’s printing plant in Montville.

The decisions come as little surprise to anyone who has watched daily newspapers shrink in profitability in recent decades due to rising costs and the loss of subscribers to digital competitors.

More than a dozen once prominent daily newspapers have gone out of business since 2017, including the Rocky Mountain News, Baltimore Examiner, Cincinnati Post, Kentucky Post, Tampa Tribune and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

The Easton Express-Times also has announced it is sifting to online-only publishing in 2025. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette already has limited its print editions to Thursday and Sunday.

Steve Alessi, President of NJ Advance Media which publishes the Star Ledger, put a positive spin on the announcement of his newspaper’s switch to digital only. “It’s important to emphasize that this is a forward-looking decision that allows us to invest more deeply than ever in our journalism and in serving our communities.”

Alessi said that that ceasing print publication will allow NJ Advance Media to reallocate resources to strengthen its core newsroom. He said that the newsroom has more reporters than it did a year ago and has plans to continue to grow in 2025 as the organization looks to bolster reporting in previously under-covered areas of the state.

While the loss of daily newspapers has deprived readers of local news coverage in many locations across the nation, some New Jersey journalists who left the Star-Ledger due to earlier layoffs or buyouts have created digital publications like NJ Spotlight News which has proven to be a worthy competitor to the dailies in statewide reporting. Others like the Patch publications provide readers with “hyper local” digital news.

How long can daily print publications like the Bergen Record, Asbury Park Press, Atlantic City Press and Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News hold on before going exclusively digital? Also saddled high printing costs and shrinking subscriptions, the answer likely is not for long.

It’s a sad passage for former newspaper reporters and editors like me (Elizabeth Daily Journal and Trenton Times) and for a previous generation of readers who cherished the smell and feel of the dependable daily broadsheet. But computer access gives us much wider opportunities to track news from around the country and around the world. And few will miss the soggy log of paper tossed into a front- yard puddle by an adolescent delivery boy.

If you like this post, you’ll love our daily environmental newsletter, EnviroPolitics. It’s packed daily with the latest news, commentary, and legislative updates from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Delaware…and beyond. Please do not take our word for it, try it free for a full month.

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Hundreds of New Yorkers get free batteries to help clean up the grid

A novel collaboration between solar installer Sunrun and utility Orange & Rockland shows how New York could tap household solar generation to advance climate goals

*Bear Mountain Bridge in Fort Montgomery, New York (Brian Logan / Getty Images)*

By Julian Spector, Canary Media

A network of more than 300 solar-powered homes started supplementing the New York grid this summer — the result of an unusual partnership that could unlock more localized clean energy for the state.

Sunrun, the nation’s largest rooftop solar installer, teamed up with utility Orange & Rockland, which serves some 300,000 customers in the suburbs and rural areas northwest of New York City, to make a compelling offer: Households signing up for solar from Sunrun could also get a free LG Chem battery pack, or a heavily discounted Tesla Powerwall.

“It’s kind of hard to turn that down,” said Christian Woods, the energy-storage project manager overseeing the program for Orange & Rockland. If anything, he said, customers were asking if this was “too good to be true.”

Read the full story here

Hundreds of New Yorkers get free batteries to help clean up the grid Read More »

How U.S. Tax Breaks Brought a Chinese Solar Energy Giant to Ohio

The Inflation Reduction Act restored American manufacturing jobs – and gave China an opportunity to extend its dominance in some clean energy technologies.

By Bloomberg News, October 29, 2024

Nestled among the corn fields of Pataskala, Ohio, Illuminate USA’s sprawling new solar factory is buzzing. Hundreds of freshly hired local employees are hoisting pallets, soldering equipment and inspecting their work as sheets of glass are transformed into state-of-the-art photovoltaic panels. They’re collecting hourly wages that start at double the state minimum. The factory has also delivered contracts to area electricians and suppliers.

Inside the plant, signs in both English and Mandarin admonish workers to clean up trash. Machine displays also toggle between the two languages. More than 100 Chinese nationals are on site working alongside more than 1,000 American colleagues, and bridging the language barrier requires lots of hand gestures and smartphone-enabled translation. Illuminate says much of this is temporary, and most of the Chinese workers will leave once the Americans are up to speed.

But long after they return home, Longi will continue to profit. The joint venture benefits from millions in economic development incentives and federal tax credits for domestic clean energy manufacturing. For its part, Longi avoids anti-China tariffs and deepens its foothold in one of the world’s fastest-growing solar markets.

The Illuminate USA plant in Pataskala. Photographer: Maddie McGarvey/Bloomberg

Companies based in or linked to China are replicating the strategy across the US. They are building or planning to build at least a dozen plants with 30 gigawatts of module-making capacity, according to a Bloomberg review of public statements, filings and other documentation. All told, the facilities would be able to supply roughly three-quarters of today’s US panel needs.

Read the full story here

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LNG Freight Rates Plunge. Too Many Ships, Too Little Demand

SINGAPORE, Oct 28 (Reuters) – Liquefied natural gas shipping rates have hit multi-year lows and may extend losses going into 2025, analysts and shipping sources said, with new tankers being added at a faster rate than LNG production is rising and spot demand still tepid.

New LNG tankers, built in anticipation of rising U.S. exports after a plunge in Russian gas supplies to Europe in 2022, are coming online earlier than liquefaction projects, which have been delayed amid inflation from strong wage growth and a shortage of skilled labor and equipment.

With more ships expected to come, freight rates for LNG tankers may remain depressed until late 2025 when new production starts up, said Samuel Good, head of LNG pricing at commodity pricing agency Argus.

Read the full story here

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Deer and wild turkey in Maine contaminated with PFAS?

The expanded advisory against eating meat from deer and turkeys in certain parts of the state is the latest consequence of Maine’s state-licensed program for farmers to use sewage sludge to fertilize their fields. The sludge has since been found to be high in harmful forever chemicals.

By Penelope Overton, Portland Press Herald

With its most popular hunting season starting Saturday, Maine has expanded a “do not eat” advisory zone for deer and turkey bagged in central Maine due to elevated levels of harmful toxic chemicals detected in recent wildlife testing.

The hunting restriction is one of the unexpected consequences of Maine’s forever chemical crisis. The state encouraged farmers to recycle sewage sludge to fertilize the agricultural fields of central Maine. While treated for pathogens, the sludge was later found high in harmful forever chemicals.

The new advisory came out last week. Maine’s firearms hunting season starts Saturday for residents. That will be the first chance for hunters who don’t use a bow-and-arrow to bag their annual deer. Fall wild turkey season began in September, depending on the area, and ends Nov. 7.

Read the full story here

If you like this post, you’ll love our daily environmental newsletter, EnviroPolitics. It’s packed daily with the latest news, commentary, and legislative updates from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Delaware…and beyond. Please do not take our word for it, try it free for a full month.

Deer and wild turkey in Maine contaminated with PFAS? Read More »

Action on energy and enviro bills yesterday in NJ Legislature

A3033 – Designates Common Eastern Bumble Bee as New Jersey State Native Pollinator.
• 10/28/2024 Passed in Assembly 75-2-0

A4569 – Appropriates $128.241 million from constitutionally dedicated CBT revenues to State Agriculture Development Committee for farmland preservation purposes.
• 10/28/2024 Substituted by S-2788 (1R)

S 286 – Permits certain local units and authorities to reduce water, sewer, and stormwater fees and other charges for low-income persons.
• 10/28/2024 Passed in Senate 27-12
• 10/28/2024 Received in Assembly and referred to Assembly Telecommunications and Utilities Committee

S2788 – Appropriates $128.241 million from constitutionally dedicated CBT revenues to State Agriculture Development Committee for farmland preservation purposes. (Copy not available)
• 10/28/2024 Substituted for A-4569 (1R)
• 10/28/2024 Passed in Assembly 77-0-0
• 10/28/2024 Received in Senate, 2nd reading in Senate to concur with Assembly amendments
• 10/28/2024 Passed in Senate and sent to Governor 40-0

S 3308 – Requires electric public utilities to implement certain improvements to the interconnection process for certain grid supply solar facilities.
• 10/28/2024 Passed in Senate 40-0
• 10/28/2024 Received in Assembly and referred to Assembly Telecommunications and Utilities Committee

S3618 – Directs DEP and DOT to establish “Wildlife Corridor Action Plan”.
• 10/28/2024 Passed in Senate 40-0
• 10/28/2024 Received in Assembly and referred to Assembly Commerce. Economic Development and Agriculture Committee

S3620 – Requires electric and gas public utilities to establish “Energy Bill Watch” program and include certain information in bills and notices to customers.
• 10/28/2024 Passed in Senate 27-13
• 10/28/2024 Received in Assembly and referred to Assembly Telecommunications and Utilities Committee

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