EnviroPolitics Blog

Implosion of former Bethlehem Steel HQ highlights changing face of the Lehigh Valley

Jen Kinney reports for WHYY

Martin Tower, the former headquarters of Bethlehem Steel, is shown days before a planned implosion. (Matt Smith for Keystone Crossroads)

Even today, nearly twenty years after Bethlehem Steel declared bankruptcy, and decades after it began its slow decline, there’s no consensus why exactly the iconic company tanked.

Some point to ballooning labor costs, others to the growing competition from cheap, foreign steel that bankrupted dozens of other American companies. But Bethlehem Steel, once the second largest steel manufacturer in the country, was hit harder than most, and some say mismanagement played a large role in the company’s demise.

That reading of history is embodied for Bethlehem residents in Martin Tower, a swank corporate headquarters built in 1972, just 10 years before the company began massive layoffs that forever changed the region.

The company went bankrupt in 2001, and Martin Tower has been vacant for a decade. But it still looms over Bethlehem, a dark, sleek monolith that — for a few more days — remains the tallest building in the Lehigh Valley.

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On Sunday, after years of uncertainty about the building’s future, the tower will be imploded to make way for new development.

This change is yet one more reminder that the steel era is long gone — but also a reminder Bethlehem has been able to adapt in the industry’s absence.

Unlike many other parts of Pennsylvania that faced declines in the wake of deindustrialization, Bethlehem has been able to preserve its history and legacy while reinventing itself as a hub for education, the arts and tourism.

Still, the demolition feels freighted with meaning for many residents of Bethlehem — both for those who want the tower to stay, and for those who are happy to bid farewell.

A long slow decline

If it weren’t for Bethlehem Steel, Frank Behum’s ancestors may never have come to America. In 1885, his great-grandfather was living in Austria-Hungary and he responded to an ad.

“‘Come to America, passage paid, guaranteed job at Bethlehem Steel,’” Behum recited.

The next three generations of his family worked at the steel plant. Behum, 68, started in 1969 and worked his way up to motor inspector. That’s how it was in Bethlehem — the company was the town. At its height, 31,000 people worked at the plant, nearly half of the town’s population of 75,000.

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Three governors pledge to cooperate to save Delaware River Basin environment

The governors call for more federal support. Gov. Phil Murphy says one way to prepare for climate change is to elect a new president

Jon Hurdle reports for NJ Spotlight

The governors of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware promised on Thursday to work together to preserve the natural resources of the Delaware River Basin but said there is only so much they can do without more federal money.

At a highly unusual joint panel discussion overlooking the river in Philadelphia, Gov. Phil Murphy plus Gov. Tom Wolf of Pennsylvania and Gov. John Carney of Delaware called for more federal support to protect environmental quality, saying that U.S. government backing is essential to safeguarding the basin which supplies drinking water to some 15 million people.

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The governors, all Democrats, signed a “proclamation” saying they would cooperate to provide clean drinking water, protect wildlife, address climate change using the best available science, and help the Delaware River Basin Commission, a water regulator that already represents the three states plus New York and the federal government.

Although Congress passed the Delaware River Basin Conservation Act (DRBCA) of 2015 during the second Obama administration — providing federal technical support and a modest $5 million a year for local conservation efforts — the U.S. government is now less active than it should be in that work, the governors said.

“It would be really nice to have a national partner,” said Wolf, whose administration this year began a process of setting health limits for two toxic PFAS chemicals after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency declined to commit to doing so. “Clean air doesn’t know state boundaries, and climate change seems to have created a lot more localized weather problems.”

Bracing for climate change

Murphy also called for more federal support and accused President Donald Trump of failing to prepare the country for climate change. Asked by moderator Collin O’Mara how communities can prepare themselves for the floods and storms that are expected to come with climate change, Murphy quipped: “How about starting with a new president?”

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‘Extraordinary’: Almost 1/4 of West Antarctic ice is now ‘unstable’

Doyle Rice reports for USA TODAY

More unsettling news from the bottom of the world.

Almost one-quarter of the ice in the West Antarctic ice sheet has been classified as “unstable,” according to a new study released this week.

This is due to the huge volume of ice that’s melted from the ice sheet over the past 25 years. Some areas are losing ice five times faster than they were in the early 1990s.

“In parts of Antarctica, the ice sheet has thinned by extraordinary amounts,” said study lead author Andy Shepherd, a polar scientist at the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom.

An iceberg at Marguerite Bay on the Antarctic Peninsula. New research finds that 24% of West Antarctic ice is now unstable. (Photo: Andrew Shepherd)

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The ice has thinned by some 400 feet in some places, the study said. The ice sheet and its glaciers are melting from underneath as warming sea water – overheated due to man-made climate change – chews away at it from below.

This map shows changes to the Antarctic ice sheet’s thickness from 1992 to 2017. Ice loss is in red while ice gained is in blue. (Photo: Shepherd et al 2019/Geophysical Research Letters/AGU.)

“Along an 1,850-mile stretch of West Antarctica, the water in front of the glaciers is too hot,” Shepherd told the Guardian. “This causes melting of the underside of the glaciers where they grind against the seabed. The melting lessens the friction and allows the glaciers then to slide more quickly into the ocean and therefore become thinner.”

A reminder: This isn’t the floating sea ice around Antarctica, which melts and refreezes with the seasons. This is freshwater ice on the gigantic ice sheets and in the glaciers that cover most of the continent.

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NJ Ratepayer Advocate goes to court to block PSEG Nuclear’s $300M bailout

The amount of the surcharge, which PSEG helped determine, likely to be a linchpin in the proceedings

Tom Johnson reports for NJ Spotlight

As expected, Rate Counsel Stefanie Brand yesterday challenged the award of $300 million in ratepayer subsidies to keep PSEG Power’s three nuclear power plants open in South Jersey in a case filed with the New Jersey Appellate Division.

The subsidies, dubbed zero-emission certificates, were given to the plants last month by the state Board of Public Utilities, a decision that ignored the recommendations of Rate Counsel, the BPU’s own staff, and an outside consultant retained by the BPU. All three concluded the plants failed to meet the financial threshold to qualify for the subsidy.

The debate over the nuclear bailout is one of the more contentious issues to come before the BPU in recent years. The scheme was opposed by some environmental groups and many business interests who argued it would drive up energy prices in a state already hit by high energy costs.

No danger of shutting down

In her filing, Rate Counsel argued the commissioners, in a 4-1 split vote, awarded the subsidies despite a six-month analysis that failed to demonstrate the plants were in danger of closing and were, in fact, profitable.

Besides deeming the award arbitrary and capricious, Brand contended the rate set in legislation establishing the ZEC program is not just and reasonable, a standard set for all rates set by the BPU.

Indeed, even a couple of BPU commissioners, in approving the subsidies in April, expressed misgivings about a provision in the legislation that required them to award the entire $300 million — even if all that was not needed to keep the plants open.

A spokesman for the BPU declined comment, saying the agency does not discuss pending litigation. BPU president Joseph Fiordaliso also declined comment, when asked by an assemblyman to explain why the board approved the subsidies during a budget hearing yesterday.

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Organic food waste program could return in Princeton

https://www.facebook.com/Solterra-Recycling-Solutions-1171917196222076/

Princeton officials are getting closer to hitting the “resume” button on the town’s organic food waste recycling program.

Lea Kahn reports for CentralJersey.com

Town officials hit the “pause” button in January after Solterra Recycling, Inc., which had the contract to haul the waste, doubled its price under a new contract.

Princeton officials also were unhappy about the sporadic pickup of the organic food waste.

At a community meeting last week, Princeton officials outlined several options under consideration that would lead to the reinstatement of the program – both short-term and long-term solutions.

Setting the tone for the April 29 meeting that drew about 100 residents, Princeton Mayor Liz Lempert assured them that Princeton Council is committed to the organic food waste recycling program. A decision on how it will be implemented will be reached by June or July.

While it has been a “really difficult time” for program participants, the good news is that the pause in service has opened up opportunities that could change how the program is handled and make it much better, Mayor Lempert said.

Robert Hough, the town’s director of Infrastructure and Operations, said the plan is for the town to collect the organic food waste. The town will buy a truck and make improvements at the Princeton Sewer Operating Committee site on River Road to accommodate the program.

“I am 99 percent sure that’s the way it is going to go,” Hough said.

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Hough said arrangements are being made to meet with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection to review the proposal. State officials seem to like it because it is food waste – not trash – that is being recycled.

But if the River Road site is not acceptable, the backup plan calls for hauling the organic food waste to Double Brook Farm in Hopewell Township, Hough said.

Matt Wasserman, president of Sustainable Princeton’s board of directors, outlined several options under consideration for handling the waste – from acquiring Metlife Stadium’s unused biodigester to a rocket composter, windrow composting at Double Brook Farm in cooperation with Cherry Valley Cooperative farm, and the bokashi fermentation method.

The Metlife biodigester is most attractive to the town because Metlife Stadium management would “gift” it to Princeton, Hough said.

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Governor signs Alabama abortion ban, which has galvanized support on both sides, setting up a lengthy fight

Mia Raven, founder POWER House, in Montgomery, Ala., on Tuesday. She and other abortion rights activists said the Alabama Senate’s approval of the nation’s most restrictive abortion ban has energized advocates, who are gearing up for a long fight. (Elijah Nouvelage/For The Washington Post)

BREAKING: Gov. Kay Ivey (R) has signed a law that bans almost all abortions in Alabama, with exceptions only in cases when a woman’s life is in danger.

Emily Wax-Thibodeaux, Chip Brownlee in Washington Post

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — As a crop duster with a banner saying “Abortion is okay,” hummed above the capitol, circling back and forth around the governor’s mansion, a group of women below let out a cheer.

“Just another day in Alabama,” said Mia Raven, director of People Organizing for Women’s Empowerment and Rights (POWER) House. “We knew this would pass and we got ready.”

Amanda Reyes, who works with an abortion fund, was wearing an “I’m on the pill” T-shirt, complete with instructions printed on the back detailing how to get a medical abortion. She also looked skyward: “Here it comes again! That’s just the coolest thing.”

Hours after the Alabama Senate voted late Tuesday to ban abortions in almost all circumstances — including in cases of rape and incest — women’s rights activists and pro-choice advocates said the decision to approve the nation’s strictest abortion measure has energized them. Knowing that the bill was designed to challenge Roe v. Wade, they are gearing up for the fight.

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