Environmental activists undertake airborne surveillance missions and on-the-ground sampling to protect communities from the air and water pollution produced by industrial-scale hog and poultry operations near them.
From Inside Climate News
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WASHINGTON, Feb 25 (Reuters) – The Biden administration’s sale of offshore wind development rights off the coasts of New York and New Jersey drew a record $4.37 billion in high bids from developers.
The auction, which began on Wednesday and stretched into Friday afternoon, is the first offshore wind lease sale under U.S. President Joe Biden, who sees the expansion of the industry as a way to tackle climate change and create jobs.
Offshore wind-farm auctions: gold in the green sector “Offshore wind is the winner,’’ said Doug O’Malley, director of Environment New Jersey, one of the many environmental groups pushing offshore wind as an alternative way of producing electricity, instead of natural gas and fossil fuels. Tom Johnson, NJ Spotlight
The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), which oversees energy development in federal waters, offered six leases across 488,201 acres (197,568 hectares) between New York’s Long Island and New Jersey, an area known as the New York Bight.
By the end of the auction, total high bids on the six blocks amounted to $4.37 billion, according to the BOEM. That is more than three times the revenue received from all U.S. offshore oil and gas lease auctions over the past five years.
Winning bidders included Ocean Winds East, Attentive Energy, Bight Wind, Atlantic Shores, Invenergy, and Mid Atlantic, according to a BOEM news release.
“This week’s offshore wind sale makes one thing clear: The enthusiasm for the clean energy economy is undeniable and it’s here to stay,” said Interior Secretary Deb Haaland.
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Jersey Central Power & Light now has the approval to spend $433 million over the next six years to install smart meters in homes and businesses of its 1.1 million customers.
In a 5-0 vote, the state Board of Public Utilities agreed Wednesday to allow the state’s second-largest electric utility to begin installing the technology, known as advanced metering technology, beginning next year. Smart meters create an integrated, two-way communications network allowing customers to make more informed decisions about how and when they use energy.
“It is a very significant development,’’ said BPU Commissioner Bob Gordon, referring to the board’s action.
The technology, widely used in the rest of the country, has the potential to reduce customers’ bills by enabling them to curb energy consumption at times when electricity prices are highest as well as speeding restoration during widespread power outages.
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NEW YORK(February 24, 2022) – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it has awarded grants for over $450,000 to two entities in New Jersey that will foster their programs to help protect wetlands. The New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority received two grants totaling $347,535, and the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection received one grant for $102,509.
“New Jersey’s wetlands are critical to supporting healthy aquatic ecosystems as well as providing flood and erosion control, stabilizing shorelines, and supplying food and habitat for fish and wildlife,” said EPA Regional Administrator Lisa F. Garcia. “These grants will help improve protections for and scientific understanding of wetlands in New Jersey.”
The New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority (NJSEA) was awarded $179,454 to measure the sustainability of marshes under future sea-level rise conditions in the Meadowlands of New Jersey. The purpose is to measure indicators of marsh resilience to identify marshes in the Hackensack Meadowlands that have the best chance of persisting under future sea-level rise.
NJSEA received a second grant for $168,081 for a project to understand how to adapt Sawmill Creek to lessen climate change weaknesses. The funding will help assess the Meadowlands’ Sawmill Creek Wildlife Management Area to improve understanding of the site’s vulnerability to increasing impacts due to climate change. Furthermore, the grantee will estimate the current carbon storage in the area and its potential future capacity to capture carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection was awarded $102,509 in grant funding to provide baseline documentation for salt marsh ponds as potential reservoirs of harmful algal blooms (HAB) for New Jersey coastal ecosystems due to climate change. Certain environmental conditions in water bodies can intensify algae growth, causing algal blooms. Blooms with the potential to harm human health or aquatic ecosystems are referred to as harmful algal blooms or HABs. The project includes a sampling of salt marsh ponds on the Tuckerton Peninsula for HAB species through laboratory analysis, performing DNA sequencing, interpretation, and the analysis of results, and developing a website to host project results and distribution maps.
EPA’s Wetland Program Development Grants provide an opportunity to promote and accelerate research and improve the ability to investigate wetlands. The program also improves the capacity to train wetlands staff, and conduct surveys and studies related to water pollution and its impacts on wetlands.
Scarlet Guarantee program means those with family incomes of $65,000 or lower can attend for free
ByROI-NJ STAFF(New Brunswick)
Officials at Rutgers–New Brunswick announced Monday a sweeping new financial aid program that will enable New Jersey students with family incomes below $65,000 to attend the university – tuition-free.
The program also provides a sliding scale that significantly limits the amount of out-of-pocket tuition and fees paid by students with family incomes below $100,000.
The Scarlet Guarantee program will be available to first- and second-year students and is linked to the Garden State Guarantee, a new statewide program launched last month by Gov. Phil Murphy that assists third- and fourth-year students.
Rutgers officials estimate that 7,600 students will be able to take advantage of the programs.
Chancellor-Provost Francine Conway said the announcement is a pivotal moment for the state.
“These new programs are transformational for our state’s students,” she said. “Students who once thought a college education could never be within reach will have the access and opportunity to fulfill their life’s ambition. I couldn’t be more thrilled that Rutgers-New Brunswick will now be more inclusive of all students.”
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A Senate panel will weigh tying New Jersey’s income tax brackets to inflation next week, giving fresh air to a tax cut proposal that has remained stalled for more than a decade.
The proposal that will come before the Senate Budget Committee on Monday would require the Division of Taxation to annually adjust New Jersey’s tax brackets to track with the Consumer Price Index. The change would be costly — it would cut tax collections by hundreds of millions of dollars each year — but it’s one Republicans say is sorely needed as surging inflation cuts into the buying power of taxpayers’ income.
“Our low and middle-income folks need this now more than ever,” said Sen. Tony Bucco (R-Morris), the bill’s prime sponsor. “They do it at the federal level, and there’s no reason we shouldn’t give that same benefit and that same tax break to our residents here in New Jersey.”
New Jersey’s income tax is paid under a series of marginal rates that grow with a filer’s income, topping out at 10.75% for income that exceeds $1 million.
At present, the state’s tax brackets only move when lawmakers approve changes to the state’s tax code.
Though the Legislature approved the creation of a new tax bracket for multi-millionaires — and later millionaires — during Gov. Phil Murphy’s first term, the state’s tax brackets for earners in lower bands have not moved since temporary tax hikes put in place by Gov. Jon Corzine that expired in 2009.
If you don’t tie tax brackets to inflation, proponents of the move argue, they capture filers they weren’t intended to. In 1996, the 6.37% bracket for $75,000 in income was intended for income that in today’s dollars translates to $136,568.
That so-called “bracket creep” is what the sponsors want to avoid.
