June 8, 2018
BOSTON, MA -- Hundreds of Boston residents and environmental leaders gathered outside the U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting this morning to urge Boston Mayor Marty Walsh to take more aggressive action on climate change.
beyond-coal-northeast
June 7, 2018
BOSTON, MA --At today’s International Mayors Climate Summit, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh announced he will be working with mayors from around the country on a bulk purchase of renewable energy.
May 24, 2018
Philadelphia, P.A. — PJM Interconnection, the regional electric grid operator for 13 states including Pennsylvania, announced the results of its capacity auction yesterday. The auction ensures that the region has enough electric generating capacity to keep the lights on in 2021. These results confirm that PJM is continuing a trend of procuring much more generating capacity than is needed for the region. As of now, it exceeds the amount necessary by almost 6 percent, which equates to over 9,300 extra megawatts of excess power, or about 10 large power plants that are unnecessary. This extra capacity artificially adds about $530 million in costs for consumers with little reliability benefit.
May 23, 2018
BOSTON, MA -- The Baker Administration announced today that Vineyard Wind has been selected to construct an 800 megawatt (MW) offshore wind project in federal waters off the coast of Massachusetts. Simultaneously the State of Rhode Island announced it will enter into negotiations with Deepwater Wind to procure 400 MW of offshore wind energy.
May 15, 2018
Albany, N.Y.— The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) released a draft pollution protection rule today that would place stringent emissions standards on existing power plants. Today’s action is a critical first step to ensure that the state reaches its goal to eliminate 40 percent of New York’s greenhouse gas emissions sector wide by 2030, while protecting New York’s air and water from outdated, dirty, and unnecessary power plants.
May 9, 2018
Pittsburgh, PA - The Sierra Club today issued a Notice of Intent to Sue NRG Energy and GenOn Americas Generation for failure to meet key Clean Air Act (CAA) and Pennsylvania State Implementation Plan (SIP) pollution protections at their Cheswick Generating Station in Springdale, PA. Via publicly available air quality monitoring data, Sierra Club has discovered that the Cheswick plant is emitting nitrogen oxide (NOx) pollution at levels beyond those allowed in its operating permit, despite having available technology installed in the plant that should ensure that pollution protection requirements are met. NRG will have 60 days to respond to the notice.
April 30, 2018
Philadelphia, P.A. — PJM Interconnection, the regional electric grid operator for 13 states including Pennsylvania, announced its grid reliability analysis for the FirstEnergy Solutions’ Beaver County Nuclear Power Plant today. The report states that transmission upgrades will be necessary to maintain grid reliability should the nuclear plant retire. Most of those upgrades are already planned and the plant should be able to retire as scheduled.
April 25, 2018
Pittsburgh, PA – The Pennsylvania Department of the Environmental Protection (DEP) hosted a public hearing today on its drafted update to the water pollution permit for the Cheswick coal-fired power plant. The plant has been polluting Pittsburgh’s air and water since 1970 and discharging wastewater into the Allegheny River and Little Deer Creek.
April 20, 2018
ALBANY, NY (April 19, 2018)—Governor Andrew Cuomo today announced a strong energy efficiency target for New York through 2025. The state’s new efficiency goal equates to saving the energy used by 1.8 million homes, and will deliver nearly one third of the state’s broader Greenhouse Gas Reduction target. The Governor’s initiative aims to “deliver benefits to New York consumers through new building retrofits, efficient appliances, and innovative technologies like heat pumps.”
March 28, 2018
Concord, NH -Massachusetts electric companies formally ended contract negotiations with Eversource’s Northern Pass transmission project for Canadian hydro today. The New Hampshire Site Evaluation Committee had already unanimously rejected the project with an oral decision earlier in the month, and is expected to issue a written order confirming that action this week.
March 21, 2018
Greene County, PA--The Center for Coalfield Justice (CCJ) and the Sierra Club filed an appeal of a permit issued by Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) that would allow Consol Pennsylvania Coal Company (Consol) to mine underneath another stream within Ryerson Station State Park despite anticipated damage. This is the fourth time the groups have been forced to file an appeal of permits for Consol’s Bailey Mine East Expansion.
March 19, 2018
PENNSYLVANIA – In a new poll conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research (GQR), Pennsylvanians show strong, bipartisan support for generating 100 percent of the state’s electricity using clean, renewable energy.