KAREN BUCKLEY WANTS out. But she can’t go anywhere because she and her husband — along with three other Marlborough families — are stuck in homes that have lost a huge amount of their value because of a gasoline spill from a neighborhood Citgo station three years ago. The Buckleys and the other families find themselves […]
Environment
Posted inEnvironment, The Back Story
Solar fight getting nasty
THE FIGHT OVER SOLAR POWER incentives is coming to a head on Beacon Hill, and it’s getting nasty. Earlier this week, the leaders of six major business groups across the state wrote a joint letter to the House and Senate chairs of the Legislature’s Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities, and Energy urging them to scale back […]
Posted inEnvironment
Mass. wins top spot on energy efficiency scorecard
MASSACHUSETTS ON WEDNESDAY WON THE TOP SPOT in the 2015 state energy efficiency scorecard for the fifth year in a row. Vermont, Rhode Island, and Connecticut were all in the top 10. The scorecard, compiled each year by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy with support from the US Energy Department, attempts to rank […]
Posted inEnvironment, The Back Story
Q&A: Sorting out solar
It seems like solar power was going great guns under former governor Deval Patrick, but now everyone is fighting about it. What’s going on? Solar did do phenomenally well under Patrick; Massachusetts became one of the nation’s leaders in solar power development. But now the Baker administration is having concerns about the high cost of […]
Posted inEnvironment, Opinion
More natural gas, not LNG, is the answer
AS NEW ENGLAND PREPARES for another winter, there is a growing consensus among energy policy makers in New England that more natural gas is needed to mitigate the high cost of electricity. After a broad investigation into the cause of New England’s high electricity prices, the Massachusetts’s Department of Public Utilities (DPU) recently concluded that […]
Posted inEnvironment
Pilgrim shifts Beacon Hill energy debate
THE LOOMING SHUTDOWN of Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Plymouth is quickly transforming the debate about energy on Beacon Hill, moving it out of the policy-wonk arena and into the political realm. The most obvious evidence of that shift came on Wednesday when the Environmental League of Massachusetts announced it was forming a super PAC […]
Posted inEnvironment
What Pilgrim decision says about energy market
NO MATTER WHERE YOU STAND on nuclear power, the thought process behind Entergy Corp.’s decision to shut down its reactor in Plymouth reveals a lot about the energy market in New England. At a press conference with reporters in Plymouth on Tuesday, Entergy officials said the primary reason they decided to shut down the plant […]
Posted inEnvironment, Politics, State House News Service
Plum Island at risk
Photographs by Mark Morelli except headline photograph by Gabrielle Gurley PLUM ISLAND ISÂ one of the most spectacular places to live in Massachusetts. With high dunes and rolling beaches on the lip of the Atlantic Ocean, people move to this barrier island north of Cape Ann for a deep blue slice of paradise. But paradise can […]
Posted inGambling
Baker administration deals blow to Wynn
STATE ENVIRONMENTAL OFFICIALS dealt a major blow to the proposed Wynn Resorts casino in Everett Friday night by ordering the Las Vegas company to make another round of revisions to its environmental impact report. Matthew Beaton, the state’s secretary of energy and environmental affairs, said he was confident the “limited items” he wants addressed can […]