Jersey shore town declares war on enviro-damaging plastic

Vendors in Monmouth Beach will be barred from providing plastic straws, like these collected on a borough beach, as well as plastic bags and plastic or styrofoam containers, effective June 1.

Vendors in Monmouth Beach will be barred from providing plastic straws, like these collected on a borough beach, as well as plastic bags and plastic or styrofoam containers, effective June 1. (Monmouth Beach Environmental Commission)

Steve Strunsky reports for NJ.com:

In a sweeping measure to address a growing environmental threat along the Jersey shore, Monmouth Beach officials voted unanimously Tuesday to ban single-use plastic bags, straws and food containers, as well as take-out Styrofoam boxes.

“This is right for the Jersey Shore and all towns,” said Mayor Sue Howard, who as one of three members of the borough’s board of commissioners voted to adopt the ban at a meeting Tuesday night. “Living on the shore you’re sensitive to the environment. Not only do we care about where we live, we want to protect that (broader) environment for our children for the future.”
The ban prohibits local restaurants, grocers and other vendors from using plastic or Styrofoam for carry-out, take-out or doggie-bag containers, or from providing plastic straws. The ordinance, which was introduced last month and takes effect June 1, includes fines of up to $2,400, though Howard said warnings would be issued for initial violations. 
Non-biodegradable plastic products have been washing up on beaches in New Jersey and throughout the world at what environmentalists say is an alarmingly increasing rate, indicating that more and more bags, bottles, straws and fragments are making their way into the ocean via storm drains, inland water ways, dumping or other avenues.

Plastic is the most common form of beach litter and debris found during annual spring and fall beach sweeps by the non-profit group Clean Ocean Action, which reported a 58.75-percent increase in plastic straws found on New Jersey beaches in 2017, an increase consistent with global figures.



Rather then sinking to the ocean floor, floating plastic or Styrofoam debris can choke, strangle or otherwise incapacitate sea creatures who ingest or become ensnared in them.   
Several municipalities along the Jersey shore have approved or are considering curbs on the use of disposable plastic items, and New Jersey is one of several states weighing a plastic ban.
What stands out about the Monmouth Beach measure, borough officials and environmentalists say, is that it prohibits bags, straws and containers, whether they are made or Styrofoam, rather than any one of those items or materials alone. 
“No one was doing all three,” said Howard, who has been mayor for 13 years in the officially non-partisan borough, home to about 3,200 residents over 3 square miles on Monmouth County’s northern Atlantic coast. “We just though its time to do it all.”
Clean Ocean Action’s executive director, Cindy Zipf, who was among several environmentalists present for Tuesday night’s vote, said Monmouth Beach could serve as a model for other communities. 


“Hopefully, this is just the beginning,” Zipf said.


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NJ heading toward tougher chemicals-in-water rule. Could it embarrass the USEPA into adopting similar standards?

If DEP adopts nation’s strictest proposal regarding PFOS, regulators could require public water systems and private well owners to limit amount of chemical in drinking water to 13 ppt

chemicals in beakers

Jon Hurdle reports for NJ Spotlight:
Scientists are recommending that New Jersey adopt the nation’s strictest limit on a toxic chemical that was once used for nonstick cookware and flame-resistant fabrics and is now linked with certain cancers, high cholesterol, and immune-system problems.
The Drinking Water Quality Institute, which advises the Department of Environmental Protection, formally said on Friday that New Jersey’s drinking water should have no more than 13 parts per trillion (ppt) of the chemical PFOS, a part of the perflurochemical family (PFCs), also known as PFAS, in order to protect public health.
If adopted by the DEP, the proposal would become a “maximum contaminant limit” (MCL), which would allow regulators to require public water systems and private well owners to keep their water below that level.
PFOS is the third type of PFC to be evaluated by the DWQI since 2014. The panel has also recommended strict limits on PFNA, which was accepted by the DEP, and PFOA, which the DEP has not yet adopted more than a year after the recommendation was made.

Higher levels in New Jersey

The chemicals have been found in New Jersey more often and in higher concentrations than in many other states. EPA tests from 2013-2015 found PFOS in 3.4 percent of New Jersey public water systems, almost twice the national rate of 1.9 percent. In other tests from 2006-2016, PFOS was found in more than half of 76 public systems.
While the PFOS proposal was in line with the DWQI’s draft report on the chemical late last year, it refocused attention on New Jersey as a national leader in the regulation of PFCs during the same week that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency called a summit to discuss possible national regulation of the chemicals. The summit was attended by New Jersey officials, including acting DEP Commissioner Catherine McCabe.

The recommended legal limit for PFOS in New Jersey is much stricter than a health-advisory level issued by the EPA, which recommends — but does not require — a level of 70 ppt for PFOS and PFOA individually or combined. 


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Watch out, Gov. Murphy, you’re about to get kneecapped

Star-Ledger Columnist Tom Moran writes:


After a killer career in the private sector, Gov. Phil Murphy is about to get an education in the frustrations of governing.


He’s had a good run, so far. In four months, he’s checked off several big items from the liberal wish list. Equal pay for women. Automatic voter registration. Funding for Planned Parenthood. A return to sanity on climate change. And a robust fight against President Trump on everything, from sanctuary cities and guns, to taxes and water pollution


“We will reclaim the progressive soul of this state,” Murphy said in March.


I sat with the governor for an hour on Monday and came away with two main thoughts.


One is that he’s a likeable guy, sincere and smart — a bit nerdy, perhaps, but bursting with genuine passion to build a more just economy, one strong enough to bring everyone aboard. I root for him to succeed.


But I’m not betting on it. Which brings us to my second thought: I have a sinking feeling that we’ve already seen the best of the Murphy Era. This could get ugly fast.


Because all signs say the Legislature is going to murder his budget next month by refusing to raise the sales tax, leaving him a whopping $581 million short. Legislative leaders say that in public, and they emphasize it in private. And Murphy has built no reservoir of good will to fall back on.


They don’t like him. They don’t fear him. And they are convinced he’s mistaken about the state’s progressive soul — at least when it comes to raising taxes.


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New Jersey, Meet your 3 new state lawmakers

NJ State House
Democrats Linda Carter, Lisa Swain, and Chris Tully were sworn in at the Statehouse in Trenton on Thursday as the newest members of the state Assembly, the lower house of the New Jersey Legislature.
Carter, a Union County freeholder, replaces the late Jerry Green, who died at age 79 last month.
Swain, the former mayor of Fair Lawn, and Tully, the former council president in Bergenfield, will be district mates.
They replace Joseph Lagana, who moved up to the state Senate last month when state Sen. Robert Gordon resigned to join the state Board of Public Utilities, and Tim Eustace, who resigned last month to take a job outside of state government.

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Places in the U.S. Where Disaster Strikes Again and Again

Flooding at the New Jersey Shore after Hurricane Sandy

Sahil Chinoy reports for The New York Times:


In the last 16 years, parts of Louisiana have been struck by six hurricanes. Areas near San Diego were devastated by three particularly vicious wildfire seasons. And a town in eastern Kentucky has been pummeled by at least nine storms severe enough to warrant federal assistance.

These places are part of a small fraction of the United States that has sustained most of the damage from major natural disasters, forming a pattern of destruction concentrated in particular areas.

About 90 percent of the total losses across the United States occurred in ZIP codes that contain less than 20 percent of the population, according to an analysis of data from the Small Business Administration.

The federal government, through disaster relief programs and flood insurance, subsidizes the cost of rebuilding in areas hit repeatedly by storms, floods and fires. Critics say that encourages too much development in those regions, wasting tens of billions of dollars in tax money and endangering lives.

Christina DeConcini, the director of government affairs at the World Resources Institute, said that federal programs do not adequately emphasize adapting to the risks posed by climate change. She said that instead of just being responsive, the government should stress building for resilience against disasters.

Some residents continue living in disaster-stricken areas because they cannot afford to leave. Others rebuff appeals to resettle, citing deep family ties or a sense of fatalism. Rather than move the town, “it’s easier to throw your hands up and say, ‘Forget it,’” said Linda Lowe, the president of a historical society in flood-prone Olive Hill, Ky.

“Abandoning a location and moving a city makes sense from a scientific, risk point of view, but the fact is that to get to a place culturally and psychologically where that conversation can be tolerated is a difficult thing to imagine,” said Dr. Irwin Redlener, the director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University. “It’s not all that rational — but I guess a lot of these things are not really rational.”



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Two new bills change the energy map for New Jersey


Governor puts signature to bill calling for half of the state’s electricity to come from renewable sources by 2030

Murphy signs energy bills May 23 2018Tom Johnson reports for NJ Spotlight:
Gov. Phil Murphy yesterday signed bills to dramatically overhaul New Jersey’s energy policies while ensuring nuclear power will remain a significant part of its energy mix — albeit with a hefty new subsidy from consumers.
In a ceremony at a solar farm in Monmouth Junction, the governor’s action marked a step toward achieving his ambitious clean-energy agenda, by requiring at least half of the state’s electricity to come from renewable energy by 2030. The plan also mandates utilities ramp up programs to reduce energy use.
“Today is a big leap forward,’’ Murphy told legislators, cabinet officials, and representatives of key environmental groups who gathered at the solar farm, which is still under construction. The governor also signed an executive order, directing the development of a new Energy Master Plan to have the state achieve 100 percent clean energy by 2050.
Whether the state can deliver on that agenda and at what cost to ratepayers will likely generate as much debate and argument over the next few years as occurred during the bruising fight to get the bills through the Legislature in the past six months.
No issue was more controversial than the measure (S-2313) to direct up to $300 million a year in ratepayer subsidies to keep three nuclear power plants from closing in South Jersey. Public Service Enterprise Group threatened to shutter them, arguing they are no longer economically competitive.


In the money — or not?

Critics, including many business groups, consumer advocates, and environmental groups, countered that PSEG never demonstrated the plants are losing money. By handing out such a huge subsidy, opponents feared it would hinder efforts to reach the aggressive renewable energy targets set by Murphy.
“What we have here in New Jersey is the company admitting they are profitable —they are just not profitable enough,’’ said Ev Liebman, director of advocacy for AARP of New Jersey. If implemented, the bill could cost residents about $41 a year, and large companies, tens of thousand of dollars annually, according to opponents.

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