The vision Mayor Walsh outlined for a resilient Boston Harbor is a promising one. Does the city, including its political leadership and business community, have the will to truly make it a reality? That remains to be seen.
The day after the election, CLF President Brad Campbell joined Staff Attorney Emily Green and special guest Jamie Hoyte – former Massachusetts Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs and currently Senior Advisor with Tremont Strategies Group – to talk through what the election results mean for New Englanders.
Massachusetts’ transportation system needs bold actions now. These are CLF’s top five recommendations for how to build transportation for the future that can improve access, reduce emissions, and prepare for future climate impacts.
“The Trump administration is endangering the health of the American people,” said Greg Cunningham, Vice President and Director of CLF’s Clean Energy and Climate Change program. “This rollback will hand a lifeline to old, polluting power plants that still haunt our communities, spreading respiratory and other illnesses among our children and families. The EPA replacement plan violates the Clean Air Act and totally disregards good science and sound economic principles.”
“How much more proof do we need that this plant is unnecessary?” said Jerry Elmer, Senior Attorney at CLF. “Invenergy’s fracked gas and fossil fuel plant would generate dangerous greenhouse gas emissions at a time when Rhode Island should be focusing on clean, renewable energy. Today’s decision makes it clear: Invenergy needs to admit defeat and stop forcing this unwanted plant on Rhode Islanders.”
There is still time to stop irreversible climate change if we act now. But we have to act fast or else the consequences will be dire and inescapable. That, in a nutshell, is what more than 90 of the top climate scientists from 40 countries around the world announced recently in a special report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (the IPCC).
Boston has no time left to waste in addressing the threat of climate change. Last winter, we experienced massive flooding in the Seaport not once but twice, and we know that more dangerous storms and rising tides are in our future. That’s why Conservation Law Foundation is applauding a plan by Mayor Marty Walsh to… Continue reading Planning, Investment, and Action Must Go Hand in Hand to Protect Boston
“Planning for open space and climate resilience is important, but planning without concrete action isn’t enough,” said Deanna Moran, Director of Environmental Planning at CLF.
“The Nuclear Regulatory Commission was absolutely correct to require these additional guarantees from NorthStar,” said Sandra Levine, Senior Attorney at CLF. “This is a major clean-up of a contaminated nuclear site that poses pollution risks for generations to come. It is not a project that should be done on the cheap, and it should not leave Vermonters on the hook to pay for cleanup efforts. The NRC clearly recognized the weakness of the proposal that Entergy presented to Vermont regulators.”
“What the tragedy in the Merrimack Valley makes clear is that we need to be weaning ourselves off natural gas now,” said Bradley Campbell, president of the Conservation Law Foundation in Boston. “This is a system with too many risks and vulnerabilities.’’
