EnviroPolitics Blog

Today’s Environmental Action in the New Jersey Assembly

By Frank Brill, EnviroPolitics Editor

A4125 – Prohibits the sale, manufacture, distribution, and use of firefighting foam containing intentionally added perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances; requires DEP to establish a collection and disposal program; appropriates $250,000.
• 12/07/2023 Passed in Assembly 71-0-0

A479 1 – Establishes “Resiliency and Environmental System Investment Charge Program.”
• 12/07/2023 Passed in Assembly 68-4-0

A5806 – Appropriates $48 million from constitutionally dedicated CBT revenues to DEP for State acquisition of lands for recreation and conservation purposes, including Blue Acres projects, and Green Acres Program administrative costs.
• 12/07/2023 Passed in Assembly 69-0-0

A5807 – Appropriates $58 million from constitutionally dedicated CBT revenues for recreation and conservation purposes to DEP for State capital and park development projects.
• 12/07/2023 Passed in Assembly 68-0-1

A58 09 – Amends lists of projects eligible to receive loans for environmental infrastructure projects from NJ Infrastructure Bank for FY 2024.
• 12/07/2023 Passed in Assembly 71-0-1

A 5810 – Amends lists of environmental infrastructure projects approved for long-term funding by DEP under FY 2024 environmental infrastructure funding program.
• 12/07/2023 Passed in Assembly 70-0-1

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Sierra Club report calls for accelerating oil well plugging

1020049846-data.jpg-1 — A crew changes the pump on an oil well southeast of Bakersfield in this file photo from 2014. Henry A. Barrios / The Californian. file

BY JOHN COX, Bakersfield.cox@bakersfield.com, Dec 5, 2023

The Sierra Club ratcheted up pressure on Kern County’s petroleum industry Tuesday by releasing a contentious report saying California policymakers should force oil companies to spend more money plugging idle oil wells. The report singled out three locally operating producers — Aera Energy LLC, California Resources Corp., and Chevron — it said earn adequate income but have not spent enough money properly retiring unused wells with the potential to cause pollution.

The companies countered that they have made substantial progress in recent years addressing idle wells, as required by state regulators. Industry trade groups, meanwhile, criticized the Sierra Club’s report as misleading.

Idle wells as an environmental issue gained greater attention last year after dozens of oil field facilities around Kern were found leaking methane at high rates in Bakersfield and Oildale. More were discovered leaking earlier this year in the Arvin and Lamont areas.

Earlier this year the state Legislature addressed the related issue of orphan wells, defined as idle facilities for which no responsible owner can be found. To make sure taxpayers don’t have to pay for future well plugging and remediation jobs, lawmakers passed a law increasing the amount of money companies have to post in the form of a bond when wells change hands.

But the Sierra Club, using Aera, CRC, and Chevron as examples, said more should be done to protect taxpayers and residents alike.

Read the full story here

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PA town says no to zoning for industrial park

tatamy road industrial park — *Nazareth Area Intermediate School’s parking lot is visible next to the land Upper Nazareth supervisors voted against rezoning Wednesday night.*

By Ryan Gaylor, Lehigh Valley News

UPPER NAZARETH TWP., Pa. — A proposed industrial park will not go forward after the Upper Nazareth Township Board of Supervisors voted Wednesday against zoning changes for the project.

About 50 people came to the meeting, where township resident Becky Bartlett gave the board a petition opposing rezoning she said included signatures from “over 130” township residents.

Of the township residents who spoke, the overwhelming majority opposed the zoning change.

Speakers cited an already traffic-choked Tatamy Rd., the proposed development’s proximity to Nazareth Area Intermediate School, and risks of the sinkhole-prone geology beneath and around the site.

Representatives for the developer suggested they may still pursue the project in the future, after negotiations allowing the township to set binding conditions for the project through zoning rules.

For now, most of the 52-acre property next to Nazareth Area Intermediate School along Tatamy Rd. will remain mostly zoned for medium-density residential development, allowing single-family homes, small apartment buildings, townhomes, and other uses.

The Northeast of the approximately T-shaped lot is zoned for extractive industries like the adjacent quarry.

It would have been the eighth project by Lehigh Valley Industrial Park, a nonprofit whose developments of the same name include a vast section of the former Bethlehem Steel plant.

Read the full story here

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Bloomberg Daily: Today’s Notes from COP28

By Will Kennedy, Bloomberg News

The most important visitor to the UAE today didn’t come anywhere near the Blue Zone. Vladimir Putin made his first trip to the Middle East since he invaded Ukraine and energy was top of the list.

His touchdown right in the middle of the biggest diplomatic event the UAE has ever hosted – where a pledge to phase down fossil fuels is the key negotiating call for many – was a real-world demonstration of the primacy the black stuff still holds in the region’s affairs. The Russian president plans to stop off in Riyadh, too, as the three OPEC+ heavyweights try to demonstrate unity.

Back at the Expo, most delegates were focused on tomorrow’s mid-COP rest day – a break from the thousands of steps racked up daily walking to, from, and around the giant site. People were debating whether to hit the beach, the giant Dubai Mall or take an 800-meter ride up the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building.

Business resumes on Friday and the second week of COP is where the negotiations take center stage. There are plenty of fights ahead. As well as the inclusion of language on the phase down of fossil fuels, COP28 CEO Adnan Amin told Bloomberg News there’s a lot of work still to do on climate finance and adaptation as the presidency tries to bridge gaps between the priorities of advanced and developing economies.

For all the anxiety about the role of fossil fuels, the UAE’s fondness for splashy announcements, and the creeping commerciality of COP, there have been significant moments in the first week.

Loss and damage got done on day one, the pledge to triple renewables has momentum and, if it’s followed through, a package on methane could mean material reductions in emissions.

America’s John Kerry has been an energetic presence all week and the veteran politician struck an upbeat tone at a mid-afternoon presser.

“We’ve had a pretty damn good week here in Dubai already,” he said. “We have some tough issues next week, but I think we have people of good faith who know that this is an international negotiation of consequence. And people will measure who steps up.”

More from COP

Kerry backs a fossil fuel phase out. The world also needs carbon capture technology to reach net zero climate targets by mid-century, the US climate envoy says.

Russia welcomes a US-led nuclear power capacity push. “Without nuclear energy it is impossible to achieve climate goals,” Deputy Economy Minister Vladimir Ilyichev says.

Do you know your NDCs from CCS? From the “Paris Agreement” to “peak emissions” and the “global stocktake,” here’s everything you need to know but have been too afraid to ask.

More from Bloomberg

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Failed reservation pipeline protests led this native American to solar

For decades, Native Americans were reliant on the US government to bring them power. Now, that may be changing.

Indigenized Energy Cody Two Bears founded Indigenized Energy, a native-led energy company installing solar farms for tribal nations in the US (Credit: Indigenized Energy)

By Lucy Sherriff BBC Features Correspondent

It was at Standing Rock, as he watched a fellow protester be cuffed and manhandled into a police car, that Cody Two Bears, a member of the Sioux tribe in North Dakota, decided he would build a solar farm.

“I realized I didn’t want to just talk about it, protest about it,” he says, reflecting on the months-long protests that took place in 2016, to prevent the Dakota Access Pipeline from being built on sacred tribal land. “I wanted to be about it.”

At the time, Two Bears was on the tribal council of the Cannon Ball community of Standing Rock. He was a key member in organizing the pipeline protests, which had hoped to prevent a 1,172 mile (1,886km) long underground pipe from transporting crude oil from North Dakota to Illinois. The pipeline was eventually built despite multiple appeals to have the line shut down. However, a lawsuit brought by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe was successful, requiring a complete environmental review of the pipeline.

“I learned about the impacts of fossil fuels on communities like ours, who don’t really have a voice,” says Two Bears. “And it seems these large infrastructural projects always happen in places of low-status communities. And one came to my backyard.”

Organisations across the US are training Native American tribes how to install solar panels in a bid to bring jobs and power to reservations (Credit: Indigenized Energy)

Read the full story here

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Waste haulers seek New York rate cap increase due to rising costs

Waste Connections truck in New York — Waste Connections is one of multiple companies asking New York’s Business Integrity Commission to raise maximum price rates. *The image by Eden, Janine and Jim is licensed under CC BY 2.0*

By Cole Rosengren, Lead Editor, Waste Dive

New York haulers are calling for the city’s commercial waste rate cap to increase by at least 9% to help offset rising costs on multiple fronts. The current maximum price allowed is $24.21 per cubic yard or $15.89 per 100 pounds.

Comments from multiple companies cited a 9% increase in the Producer Price Index’s solid waste collection category since September 2022, along with rising costs related to disposal, labor, commercial containerization requirements, and an upcoming congestion pricing system.

Waste Connections, the National Waste & Recycling Association’s local chapter, Mr. T Carting, Century Waste Services, M&M Sanitation, and D&D Carting all weighed in following a recent hearing by the city’s Business Integrity Commission.

Haulers throughout the industry have been raising prices to keep up with inflation and related costs in recent years, but in New York City that ability is more limited due to a regulatory process. Last year, the BIC approved a 9% increase in June and a 7% increase in October, the first time it had done so twice in one year.

The agency is required to hold a hearing on this issue every other year, but it is not obligated to make adjustments to the rate cap. In the past, adjustments have generally come multiple months after the hearings.

Read the full story here

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