EnviroPolitics Blog

Rate of solid waste facility fires prompts a renewed look at battery recycling efforts

The media reported 390 waste and recycling facility fires in the U.S. and Canada in 2022, the highest number since Fire Rover started tracking reports. EPR laws and federal funding aim to reduce risk.

Old battery packs for mobile phones — *Andrey Deryabin via Getty Images*

Fires at waste and recycling facilities continued to be a problem in 2022, with at least 390 incidents reported by the media in the United States and Canada, according to data from Fire Rover, a fire suppression system company.

During a recent webinar hosted by the National Waste & Recycling Association, Ryan Fogelman, a partner at Fire Rover, said that number is the highest since he started collecting fire incident data in 2016. That compares to 367 reported incidents in 2021 and 317 in 2020. In 2022, waste and recycling facility fires caused 56 reported injuries and 2 reported deaths, he said.

The industry has long suspected that lithium-ion batteries are a growing fire hazard because of their tendency to ignite when crushed or bent — and their increasing prevalence in everything from light-up shoes to birthday cards. Recent state and federal actions aim to curb fires by bolstering safe collection strategies.

Pinpointing the cause of these fires can be tough, Fogelman said, partly because media reports often don’t list a cause, but anecdotal reports show a significant portion of facility fires are related to batteries. Waste and recycling operations face other diverse fire hazards because of the nature of their facilities, he said, which often house large machinery, store combustible chemicals and perform hot work tasks that can emit sparks.

“We’re starting to see some really serious lithium-ion battery-specific fires,” he said.

In a recent example, operators of the Seminole County Central Transfer Station in Florida, which experienced a fire in December that caused almost $500,000 of damage, told local news station WESH that the fire was likely caused by lithium-ion batteries.

Batteries are also to blame for smaller fires. In February, a laptop caught fire inside a Rumpke Waste & Recycling truck in Columbus, Ohio, prompting the driver to pull into an empty parking lot to dump the load. Officials in both incidents urged residents not to put battery-containing items in the trash, instead asking them to take batteries to a nearby hazardous waste disposal facility or to a retailer that offers recycling options.

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Pennsylvania woman who broke into Pelosi’s office draws a three-year prison sentence

Riley June Williams was investigated in connection with the theft of Nancy Pelosi’s laptop, and its possible sale to Russia, for months.

Riley June Williams (Dauphin County Prison)

By Justin Heinze, Patch Staff

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The young Pennsylvania woman who helped break into Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office on Jan. 6, and whose age and actions brought her notoriety and made her one of the iconic faces of the insurrection, has been sentenced to three years in prison, a judge ruled on Thursday.

Riley June Williams, 23, of Harrisburg, had been convicted in November of interfering with law enforcement officers during a civil disorder and related counts. The sentence was handed down by U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson in Washington, D.C.

The charges she was convicted of held a maximum penalty of up to 25 years behind bars. Prosecutors had sought at least 7.

Williams was among the mob that broke into the Capitol through the Senate Wing door at about 2:15 p.m. on Jan. 6, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the District of Columbia said.

Authorities said Williams “directed” other rioters, pushed against officers and recorded videos of the incident. Once in Pelosi’s office, Williams filmed the theft of the laptop, authorities said. It was initially believed that Williams had stolen it herself, and she was investigated for months under possible suspicion of selling it to Russi

According to investigators, a tipster told the FBI that Williams intended to send the computer device to a friend in Russia, who then planned to sell it to SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence service, the affidavit said.

Williams fled after Jan. 6, deleting all of her social media profiles and losing contact with friends and family, officials said. She was arrested on Jan. 18 in Harrisburg.

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JCP&L to pay back customers after audit of its parent company, FirstEnergy of Akron

The utility spent ratepayer money on lobbying, other expenses

JCP&L crew installing automated devices to help reduce power outages

By TOM JOHNSON, ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT WRITER, NJ Spotlight News

Jersey Central Power & Light owes customers $9.6 million after improper costs were allocated to ratepayers, including funds possibly spent in a bribery scandal in Ohio, according to audits of its parent company, FirstEnergy of Akron, Ohio.

New Jersey’s second-largest utility mentioned paying out the refunds, which include interest, in a filing for a $185 million rate increase for its 1.1 million customers with the state Board of Public Utilities last week. If granted, the typical residential customer would see their monthly bill increase by $8.45, or 7.5%.

Chris Hoenig, a JCP&L spokesman denied that any of the money raised from ratepayers in New Jersey was spent in Ohio. “What we are refunding is money that was spent in New Jersey,’’ he said. It included, among other things, advertising, sponsorships, and lobbying. “The $9 million has nothing to do with Ohio,’’ he added.

Earlier this month, the former speaker of the Ohio House and former Republican state chairman were convicted in a $60 million bribery and lobbying scheme to pass a bailout bill for FirstEnergy, the utility’s parent, and its nuclear power plants.

‘There is going to be a lot of forensic digging in this rate case. We are going to make sure what happened in Ohio doesn’t impact New Jersey ratepayers.’ — Brian Lipman, New Jersey Division of Rate Counsel

An audit made public in February by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission found FirstEnergy included costs for the Ohio bribery investigation in all rates for all 10 of its franchised public utilities, including JCP&L, according to Dave Anderson, policy and communications manager at the Energy and Policy Institute, a watchdog on clean energy and utility interests.

That audit spurred the agency to look into changes in accounting procedures governing utilities, Anderson said. Meanwhile, reports about the Ohio bribery investigation led the New Jersey BPU to launch an audit of JCP&L in May of 2021.

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Cornell engineering research makes stunning claim about why it’s important to manufacture solar panels in North America

The research claims that if solar panel manufacturing were to return to the U.S. by 2035, emissions resulting from panel creation would be reduced by 30%, and energy consumption would be cut by 13%, compared to 2020.

Solar Panel Manufacturing and Testing. (Archive Photo)Bookmark

By DERICK LILA, pvbuzz

Domestic production of solar panels – most of which are now made in Asia – can speed up decarbonization in the U.S. and reduce climate change faster, according to new Cornell Engineering research published March 8 by Nature Communications.

“If we bring the solar panel manufacturing back to the U.S., it helps us realize decarbonization goals faster,” said Haoyue Liang, a doctoral student in systems engineering, who co-authored “Reshoring Silicon Photovoltaics Manufacturing Contributes to Decarbonization and Climate Change Mitigation” with Fengqi You, the Roxanne E. and Michael J. Zak Professor in Energy Systems Engineering.

“As solar photovoltaic panels emerge as a major power source that will characterize the U.S. energy market for the remainder of the 21st century,” Liang said, “manufacturing and sourcing panels here will align with our climate targets and our energy policy goals.”

Manufacturing crystalline silicon photovoltaic panels in the U.S. solves logistical challenges and eases greenhouse gas problems, according to the paper.

The scientists analyzed production in the U.S. to learn how it could shrink greenhouse gas emissions and energy use. If solar panel manufacturing can return to the U.S. by 2035, the greenhouse gas emissions resulting from panel creation would be reduced by 30% and energy consumption would be cut by 13%, compared to 2020, when the U.S. relied almost entirely on international trading partners.

By 2050, the solar panels made and used in the U.S. will be more efficient and will reduce the carbon footprint by 33%, and use 17% less energy than solar panels sourced globally in 2020.

The climate-change mitigation forecast would be fulfilled by both reshoring the solar panel manufacturing back to the U.S. and having mostly renewable energy on the power grid, which is anticipated in the next decades.

Based on projections about the energy decarbonization transition that happens alongside reshoring, You said, the U.S. will see a larger share of renewable power accounting for primary energy consumption and an overall lower primary energy consumption over the years for solar panel manufacturing.

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On World Water Day, DOE Announces Investments to Advance Water Power as a Source of Clean Energy

Collegiate Competitions, Fellowship Selections, and New Prize will Advance Marine Energy and Hydropower Technologies and Workforce

From the U.S. Department of Energy

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today, on World Water Day, launched a $2.3 million prize to advance new technologies to harness power from ocean waves. DOE also opened applications for the next rounds of the hydropower and marine energy collegiate competitions and announced five students selected for fellowships to advance marine energy research.

Marine energy and hydropower are versatile, reliable sources of renewable energy that will play key roles in meeting the Biden administration’s goals of a carbon-free electricity sector by 2035 and a net-zero-emissions economy by 2050. To capture these resources, DOE invests in research and development to advance these technologies and supports workforce development efforts to build the future clean energy workforce.

Today, DOE announced:

The launch of the Innovating Distributed Embedded Energy Prize (InDEEP) to advance new technologies to harness and convert power from ocean waves. The three-phase prize will foster the development of distributed embedded energy converter technologies (DEEC-Tec), which combine many small energy converters, often less than a few centimeters in size, into a single, larger ocean wave energy converter. InDEEP aims to support early-stage DEEC-Tec research that lays the foundation for the eventual deployment of these technologies at all scales, including providing power to electricity grids.

The opening of applications for the second annual Hydropower Collegiate Competition and the fifth annual Marine Energy Collegiate Competition. These two competitions help undergraduate and graduate students prepare for jobs in hydropower, marine energy, and related industries by challenging them to develop unique solutions to advance these technologies. These competitions strive to engage students with a wide range of skills, experiences, and perspectives to prepare them for many different roles in these fields.
Five Ph.D. and master’s students were selected to participate in the Marine Energy Graduate Student Research Program. These students will undertake research to advance the understanding and development of marine energy resources through work with DOE’s national laboratories and other government and industry partners, including the Department of Defense.

Marine energy uses natural energy from moving water—such as waves, tides, and river and ocean currents—to produce renewable power. The power coursing through oceans and rivers equates to nearly 60% of the United States’ total electricity needs in 2019. Even if only a small portion of this technical resource potential is captured, marine energy could make significant contributions to the nation’s energy needs.

Meanwhile, hydropower is one of the oldest and largest sources of renewable energy. In 2021, hydropower accounted for 31.5% of U.S. renewable electricity generation, while pumped storage hydropower remains the largest contributor to U.S. energy storage, representing roughly 93% of all commercial storage capacity in the United States.

These initiatives are led by DOE’s Water Power Technologies Office (WPTO).

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Nine-car PATH trains debut on the Newark-World Trade Center line

Longer PATH nine car trains start rolling — Construction crews had to drill rock in order to lengthen platforms at the Exchange Place PATH station in Jersey City in 2022. That work allowed PATH to run longer nine-car trains which begin operation Thursday, March 23.

By Larry Higgs | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

The first nine-car train in the PATH’s 100-year history will start rolling on the busy Newark-World Trade Center line Thursday morning, Gov. Phil Murphy and Port Authority officials announced Wednesday.

Murphy and Port Authority of New York and New Jersey officials made the announcement Wednesday at the Harrison station that spells relief for commuters who’ve coped with crowded trains and platforms. The longer trains will be phased in gradually during the next 12 months, with a goal for nearly all trains on the NWK-WTC line at peak times to be nine-car trains by the beginning of 2024, officials said.

Harrison Council Jame Doran recalled the situation that PATH’s $1 billion expansion program and nine-car trains are addressing.

“It was a little like getting in a sardine can it was so crowded,” he said. “I thank the Port Authority for recognizing it with the extended trains and building a new (Harrison) station.”

Nine-car trains start a gradual roll-out starting with the Thursday morning rush and afternoon, which will increase over time.

The longer trains are being made possible by two separate projects – one completed last year to lengthen five New Jersey station platforms to accommodate nine cars, and the other which began last September when the first of 72 new PATH PA-5 railcars started arriving in Port Newark.

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