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Biomass

MA Biomass Sustainability and Carbon Policy: Public Meeting in Holyoke

by Press Release | Dec 8, 2009 2:19 pm | Comments (0)

Public Meeting Announcement
Massachusetts Biomass Sustainability and Carbon Policy
Thursday, December 17, 2009
6:30 – 8:30 P.M., Holiday Inn, 245 Whiting Farms Road, Holyoke, MA

In November 2009 the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER) commissioned a team of experts to conduct a comprehensive study of issues related to biomass sustainability and carbon policy. Launched at the direction of Energy and Environmental Affairs (EEA) Secretary Ian Bowles, the six-month study will result in a “white paper” that brings the best science to bear as DOER considers the path forward for biomass energy policy, including the preparation of new regulations to establish sustainability criteria biomass facilities must meet under the Massachusetts Renewable Portfolio Standard.

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Massachusetts Biomass Subsidies on Hold

by Mary Serreze | Dec 4, 2009 3:53 pm | Comments (0)

In a move that took Western Massachusetts environmental activists by surprise, the Commonwealth on Thursday announced that it will suspend its consideration of biomass energy applications for qualification under the state’s Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) until a biomass sustainability study is completed.

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C&D Incinerator in Springfield Almost Fully Permitted

by Mary Serreze | Nov 21, 2009 4:47 pm | Comments (0)

“Opponents of a proposed biomass plant at 1000 Page Boulevard say that concerned members of the public have three opportunities left to comment on the facility and possibly stop its construction.”

G. Michael Dobbs, Managing Editor of Turley Publications’ The Reminder, has been following the permitting of an electricity-generating incinerator in Springfield that would burn construction and demolition debris generated from across New England. Read his latest post here.

State Biomass Sustainability and Carbon Policy Study Launches

by Press Release | Nov 7, 2009 10:19 am | Comments (0)

Patrick-Murray Administration Launches Biomass Sustainability Study: White paper will inform Department of Energy Resources regulations for qualifying biomass facilities under the state’s Renewable Portfolio Standard

BOSTON – The Department of Energy Resources (DOER) today announced its selection of the Manomet Center for Conservation Services of Plymouth to lead a comprehensive study of issues related to biomass sustainability and carbon policy. Launched at the direction of Energy and Environmental Affairs (EEA) Secretary Ian Bowles, the six-month study will result in a “white paper” that brings the best science to bear as DOER prepares new regulations to establish sustainability criteria biomass facilities must meet under the Massachusetts Renewable Portfolio Standard.

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Massachusetts Ballot Initiative to Reduce Air Pollution from Biomass Burning

by Guest Columnist | Oct 15, 2009 11:15 am | Comments (0)

Left: Rob Fish, Northampton regional organizer for the ballot initiative to limit CO2 emissions from waste and biomass incinerators.

This Just In:

A citizen-led network is waging a statewide campaign to place on the 2010 ballot a question to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in Massachusetts.

The ballot question will limit carbon dioxide emissions from biomass and waste to energy incinerators to 250 pounds per megawatt hour. Currently, these incinerators produce more carbon dioxide (a greenhouse gas) than coal burning plants, yet they receive taxpayer and ratepayer subsidies intended for clean energy.

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Change the Law that says that Biomass Burning is Green

by Guest Columnist | Oct 4, 2009 10:12 am | Comments (0)

To the Editor:

People are gathering signatures all over Massachusetts in an effort to curtail biomass subsidies. This state ballot question would allow voters to stop paying tax and ratepayer money to build and run biomass incinerators. This would be accomplished by limiting the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) that biomass plants can emit in order to qualify as “renewable energy” under Massachusetts law.

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Sign the ‘Stop Spewing Carbon’ State Ballot Petition

by Guest Columnist | Oct 1, 2009 6:17 am | Comments (0)

Dear Friends and Fellow Citizens,

Please visit the website StopSpewingCarbon.com to find information about the citizen “Initiative Petition to Change the Law in Massachusetts” regarding the allowable limit of CO2 emissions from new power plants in the Commonwealth. I am one of the 10 original petitioners, and now that the petition has been certified, we must collect 100,000 signatures in the next 6 weeks to ensure that the proposed new law can be debated and voted upon in November of 2010.

We are trying to stop biomass incinerators. Biomass is a nice sounding term that denotes a set of things including public forests, trash including hospital waste, construction and demolition debris. Those biomass power plants (incinerators that make a tiny bit of electricity) emit at least 50% more CO2 than coal per kilowatt hour (depending on what exactly is burned)—as well as other greenhouse gases and toxins.

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Deforestation: It Can’t Happen Here, Right?

by Guest Columnist | Sep 24, 2009 7:39 am | Comments (0)

By Don Ogden

In ancient times some places we now know as vast arid deserts, or desert-like plains, were deeply forested and thrived with abundant wildlife. What happened? Human populations pushed the envelope too far. The human race has a distressing penchant for clear-cutting great stretches of forest to feed fires, build cities, sail fleets, graze herds, or do whatever. Making matters worse, we seem to have had little interest in replanting, or better yet, intelligently managing such forests. Some gruesome examples include the once “Fertile Crescent” in the Mideast; the ancient Mediterranean;Haiti in the Caribbean, but also in the more recent past, giant swaths of the Amazon.

Continue reading ‘Deforestation: It Can’t Happen Here, Right?’ »

“82 Degrees is Lethal to Salmon”: Russell Biomass

by Mary Serreze | Sep 21, 2009 9:33 am | Comments (0)

“It doesn’t pass muster,” Peter M. Schilling, representing the Massachusetts/Rhode Island Council of Trout Unlimited, said of the proposed warm water discharges into the Westfield River proposed by Russell Biomass. “Eighty-two degrees in lethal to salmon.”

Read about Thursday’s Russell Biomass forum at MassLive.

Contradance for the Climate

by Mary Serreze | Sep 17, 2009 2:57 pm | Comments (0)

Concerned Citizens of Franklin County are holding a contradance on Friday, September 18th, 8:00, at the Guiding Star Grange on Chapman Street in Greenfield. It costs ten dollars to get in. A great band will be playing. All proceeds will go to this citizens’ group’s efforts to stop a 47-megawatt biomass plant from being built in that town’s industrial park. Yes, we’re biased. Go, dance, have a blast, meet new people, and support a worthy cause.

Greenfield Citizens Force Recall Vote on Biomass Wastewater Decision

by Guest Columnist | Jan 14, 2010 9:33 am | Comments (0)

Concerned Citizens of Franklin County has orchestrated an unbelievable show of public opinion against the Greenfield Town Council’s recent votes to allow PRE LLC—that is, Pioneer Renewable Energy—to purchase wastewater from the town. PRE LLC is the developer of the proposed biomass plant and needs the water for the “wet cooling” aspect of the giant inferno with the 250 foot chimney that would burn 1500 tons of wood daily.

On January 7, Franklin County community leaders Janet Sinclair and Sandy Kosterman announced that 1,727 signatures had been gathered in support of a petition to rescind those Town Council votes. That number is nearly 3 times the number that is required for the petition to go forward. It’s hard to guess how many of the 1,727 will be certified as properly belonging to registered Greenfield voters, but the Town Clerk is on the job and we will know soon. Petition experience would suggest that 70% of the signatures will be certified, which would be more than double the number required.

Undeer PRE’s proposal, approximately 600,000 gallons of wastewater would be evaporated and released as steam from a 30 foot stack. Citizens have expressed science-based concerns for the safety of breathing vaporized chemicals, because wastewater treatment procedures leave non-biological pollutants in the water. Normally, the wastewater goes into the river, where the fish, plants and soil must adapt to the chemical soup that is made from what we flush down our drains at home and work.

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that go untreated by municipal wastewater plants are in waterways around the country; some scientists think this chemical pollution is the cause of ‘evolved’ fish bodies that are neither male nor female. Here in Greenfield, the fathead minnow is our closest natural ally. At the public hearing before the Town Council voted, we were told that the fathead minnow test had been conducted, that the water was fine for the minnow and therefore is fine for us, too.

Well, is the water really fine for the fathead minnow? How many generations are examined? What makes the fathead minnow the right stand-in for the human subject in the pollution tolerance test? These are the kinds of things we are thinking about in Greenfield, and 1,727 people signed the petition that says WAIT, rescind that vote, question, answer, study and learn our way safely through the treacherous times of war, disease, global warming and squandered resources leading to depression psychologically and financially, necessitating a new growth of strength from the field of wildflowers, otherwise known as “we the people.”

Tonight it was announced that we the people of Greenfield prevail upon the Town Council to force a new vote, and if they do not rescind, then to force a public and binding vote in lieu of the Town Council. This could be the beginning of the end for PRE LLC in Greenfield. Congratulations are due to that community.

Former EPA Lawyers on the Climate Bill

by Mary Serreze | Oct 5, 2009 11:00 am | Comments (0)

Meanwhile, executives from the Dow Chemical Co., Entergy Corp., Nike Inc. and more than 140 other companies and venture capital firms will convene in Washington this week to lobby Senate lawmakers to pass a comprehensive climate and energy bill quickly. And we’re worried about clotheslines?

100 plus at Russell biomass special permit hearing

by Mary Serreze | Sep 11, 2009 11:51 am | Comments (0)

100 plus at Russell biomass special permit hearing

RUSSELL, Mass. (WWLP) – The opposition is not backing down in its efforts to keep a wood-burning power plant from locating in the town of Russell.

More than one hundred people came to the Russell Elementary School Gym Thursday night for a combined Planning and Zoning Board public hearing.

Read About It at WWLP Channel 22 News

US EPA visits Russell re BIomass Plant

by Mary Serreze | Sep 4, 2009 9:42 am | Comments (0)

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