PADEP reaches settlement over Mariner East 2 pipeline

Mariner_East_2_pipeline_activity

    • Marie Cusick reports for
      StateImpact:
  • The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental protection has reached a settlement with three environmental groups that were challenging its issuance of permits for the embattled Mariner East 2 pipeline.
The pipeline is planned to carry natural gas liquids from western Pennsylvania to an export terminal near Philadelphia; it has faced numerous problems throughout its construction — including spills, sinkholes, and legal disputes, like this one.
In 2017,  the Clean Air Council, Delaware Riverkeeper Network, and Mountain Watershed Association challenged the construction permits DEP issued to Sunoco for the project.
“While this doesn’t cure the violations that have already taken place, it puts in place critical protections for future projects,” said Maya van Rossum, of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network. “Holding this company accountable and holding the DEP accountable at every turn is vitally important.”
Lisa Dillinger, a spokeswoman for Sunoco’s parent company, Energy Transfer Partners, said the settlement agreement will have no impact on the project.
“From the outset, Sunoco has maintained that the permits were properly and lawfully issued by PADEP and fully protective of the environment,” she wrote in an email.
The state Public Utility Commission has temporarily halted construction on the project in West Whiteland, Chester County due to safety concerns.
On Thursday DEP agreed to pay $27,500 to the environmental groups, money that will help them recoup costs. The agency also agreed to implement new policies aimed at enhancing public participation around pipeline projects.
Among other things, DEP has pledged to post more information online, including non-privileged, non-confidential materials it receives from companies seeking pipeline permits, as well as technical deficiency letters it issues to pipeline companies, and final decision documents.

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NJ proposes critical offshore-wind funding rule

Board of Public Utilities explains key funding mechanism for offshore-wind projects. Developers are keen, but some clean-energy advocates chide agency for lack of specifics

Tom Johnson reports for NJ Spotlight:

The state yesterday proposed a funding mechanism to develop offshore wind, one of the first concrete steps and perhaps most critical of the regulatory components needed to build wind farms off the Jersey coast.

The new rule, proposed by the Board of Public Utilities (BPU), sets forth the framework for how ratepayer subsidies will flow to the offshore-wind developers and how revenues earned by projects from the wind-generated electricity will be returned to utility customers.
More significantly, the mechanism, dubbed Offshore Renewable Energy Certificates (ORECs), ensures that project developers obtain a steady and long-term stream of funding that will allow them to gain financing for the wind farms from Wall Street.
The BPU did not release any version of the proposed rule, which is expected to be published in the New Jersey Register within the next few weeks, so details about exactly how the system would function remain unclear.
The proposal, however, was welcomed by offshore-wind developers and clean-energy advocates, who have been waiting eight years for the BPU to propose such a rule. During the prior administration of Gov. Chris Christie, the agency had developed a rule, but it never won approval from the governor, who had cooled on the prospect of developing offshore-wind energy.

It’s a significant piece of the puzzle

“It’s significant because it is the final piece of the regulatory program that will enable the development of offshore wind,’’ said Scott Weiner, a former BPU president who now represents Deepwater Wind, one of four offshore developers expected to submit applications to the agency to build wind farms.
The step also won praise from Gov. Phil Murphy, who wants the state to build 3,500 megawatts of offshore wind by 2030, the most aggressive target in the nation. Initially, the BPU’s target is to approve 1,100 megawatts.
“There has been more activity in the first six months of this administration when it comes to achieving our offshore wind goals than there was in the eight years since the signing of the Offshore Wind Economic Development Act,’’ Murphy said in a press release. “The action by this board shows we are truly all-in on offshore wind.’’
But they still have a long way to go. Offshore-wind developers are pressing the BPU to begin accepting applications before the end of the year, fearing that if the state does not move swiftly, they will not be able to qualify for lucrative federal tax credits. The credits expire at the end of 2019 and developers need to start spending big dollars on their projects before then or they will not qualify for the incentives.

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Solar’s hitting a cap in SC, with thousands of jobs at stake

Solar energy’s popularity jumped with net metering. Now, utilities plan to cap the program 3 years earlier than expected, and it’s an issue in the governor’s race.

James Bruggers reports for Inside Climate News:

Solar installation. Credit: Alexandra Beier/Getty Images

On July 31, Duke Energy plans to cap its net-metering program in South Carolina. After that, customers adding new solar systems will get less favorable rates. Credit: Alexandra Beier/Getty Images
South Carolina shot from almost no solar energy to having enough to power nearly 100,000 homes in less than four years, but it’s about to slam on the brakes.
When the state legislature passed its landmark energy bill in 2014, it ushered in a net-metering system that allows residential and smaller-scale commercial power customers with solar panels to get credit at retail rates for the power they produce and send back to the grid.
But the legislation had a catch: Once solar output reached 2 percent of utilities’ peak power production, the utilities could cap the program.
On July 31, Duke Energy plans to do just that for a large swath of the state. Two other utilities are also expected to hit 2 percent in the coming months, solar installers say. Customers who already have net metering won’t see any change until the whole program is due to expire in 2025, but Duke Energy customers who add solar after this month will get much less favorable rates.
This is all coming three years earlier than expected, and it could put as many as 3,000 solar jobs at risk.

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Rutgers nixes dining hall trays, turns food waste into feed

James M. O’Neil reports for The Record:

 At the dining halls on the Rutgers University campus, there are no trays. Instead, students carry their food to the table with their hands.

It is one way the university decided to tackle food waste, and it ended up saving money, too.

With trays, students tended to pile on multiple plates of food and pour several glasses of milk just so they wouldn’t have to get up again for seconds.

“But you can only eat so much, and they would routinely put more on their tray than they could consume,” said Joe Charette, the executive director of Rutgers Dining Services.

At first, some students grumbled about the trayless policy, but within a few weeks that stopped, Charette said. And the savings were significant.

In the first 10 weeks, Rutgers saved $300,000 in food costs and, depending on the meal, saw a 14 to 22 percent reduction in what students tossed after they ate.

Rutgers’ four main dining halls each serve 7,000 meals a day. The system as a whole serves 35,000 meals a day, or 6.5 million a year. Overall, going trayless saves Rutgers about $30,000 a week, Charette said.


The policy spurred Charette to post an April Fool’s Day video about the “next” step in the Rutgers plan — going plateless.

Rutgers is among a growing number of universities that have gone trayless, including the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. and Williams College in Williamstown, Mass.

Charette said he is in favor of New Jersey’s goal to cut food waste in half by 2030, but is concerned about how that will be measured.

“We’ve already been reducing food waste and refining it — are we supposed to reduce it by 50 percent on top of that?” he said. “Versus someone who’s never done it and there’s a lot they can do right off the bat? It will be important to see how the state rolls out this plan with measurable numbers and how they can apply it fairly.”

Rutgers has a long history of trying to reduce the amount of food waste that ends up in landfills.

Steve Pinter, who operates Pinter Beef and Pork Farm in Hillsborough, visits Rutgers six days a week to pick up 55-gallon barrels filled with food leftovers, which he feeds to his hogs.


The Somat grinds up food leftover food and drops into green barrels. The barrels are then sent to Pinter Farm to feed the livestock, as opposed to the food ending up in a landfill. Busch Dining Hall at Rutgers in Piscataway on Wednesday July 18, 2018.  (Photo: Anne-Marie Caruso/NorthJersey)
Pinter’s father did the same, and so did his grandfather, who drove a horse and cart down College Avenue in New Brunswick to pick up the Rutgers students’ scraps, Charette said.

When students return their plates after a meal, Rutgers cafeteria workers scrape the leftovers into a long trough filled with water. The water carries the food waste to a machine with an auger, which grinds it up and squeezes out the water, reducing the volume by 80 percent. The result, a pinkish byproduct with the consistency of ground beef, goes into the barrels, which are stored in a walk-in refrigerator to await Pinter’s next visit to campus.

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Former NJ Gov. Whitman: Trump unfit to remain in office









In a July 22 op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, former New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman wrote:


President Trump’s disgraceful performance in Helsinki, Finland, and in the days since is an indication that he is not fit to remain in office. Trump’s 2016 “America First” platform might be more aptly named “Russia First” after the disaster that occurred last week.

Trump’s turn toward Russia is indefensible. I am a lifelong Republican. I have campaigned and won as a member of the party, and I have served more than one Republican president. My Republican colleagues — once rightfully critical of President Obama’s engagement strategy with Russian leader Vladimir Putin — have to end their willful ignorance of the damage Trump is doing both domestically and internationally. We must put aside the GOP label, as hard as that may be, and demonstrate the leadership our country needs by calling on the president to step down.

Trump’s sycophantic relationship with Putin is unsurprising given his previous comments about Russia and its dictator. What is shocking is how long he has possessed — and disregarded — hard evidence of Putin’s direct role in undermining our elections. According to the New York Times reporting, he saw dispositive emails and texts early in January 2017.

Trumps’ repeated public dismissals of the intelligence coming from his own deputies are deeply disturbing. Along with his walk back of statements last week, and then walking back the walk backs, it’s impossible to keep up, and his behavior warrants a fresh evaluation of whether the president can be trusted with the future of the United States. His apologists will argue that the current outcry is just another attempt by moderates and “establishment” Republicans to discredit the president. But what does this man have to say or do for his supporters to finally see that his actions are detrimental to the country?

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That ‘more-expensive’ electric vehicle may actually cost less than the conventional gas car you’re comparing it to

Steve Hanley reports for  Clean Technica:     

Electric vehicles cost more than conventional cars. It’s a scientific fact, as Homer Simpson might say. But is it true? Consolidated Edison and National Grid have both enlisted the aid of Enervee, a Los Angeles company that invokes “data-science, behavioral science, and digital marketing” to help utilities steer their customers toward the purchase of energy-efficient appliances. Now it has applied its skills to create a website for both utilities that compares the cost of purchasing an electric car directly to the cost of purchasing a similar vehicle with an internal combustion engine.
EV cost comparitor Con Ed
Enervee’s calculator rates just about every car sold in America, determines the base sales price, calculates the cost of fuel or electricity over time, figures in any federal, state, and local rebates available, and arrives at the bottom line, which it calls its “clearcost.” It also assigns an efficiency rating for each vehicle. The result? In many cases, the EV actually turns out to cost less to own then the gasmobile, as reported by Greentech Media.
For instance, a Volkswagen Jetta with the 1.8 liter engine lists for $31,463. The clearcost of a Hyundai Ioniq Electric? $26,675. But wait, you say, the Jetta lists for $23,245 and the Ioniq lists for $29,500. How can the Hyundai cost less? Simple. The Jetta will use an estimated $8,218 in fuel over five years. The Ioniq will consume about $2,818 in electricity over the same period of time. Also, the Ioniq is eligible for a federal tax credit of $4,543 and a New York State Drive Clean rebate of $1,100. The net result is the Hyundai will cost almost $5,000 less to own.

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