By Peter Rovick
Guest Columnist

Stop by the front yard of one home in Wellesley, and you will notice that something is different. There are no sprinklers, and in fact, there is no grass. The front yard at my home at 12 Appleby Road, in the Wellesley Square and Dana Hall areas, consists entirely of carefully planned landscaping, consisting of trees, bushes, and other plants, including ferns.

A local landscaper from Sudbury has helped us to design and implement a low cost, low maintenance front yard that actually saves us money and helps the environment.

Read more of Rovick's post here.

Seven students dressed as Santa and his elves delivered “coal” to Sen. John Kerry in Boston last week – but it was not because he’s been bad.

The group, part of three teams of students bicycling across Massachusetts to meet with residents about climate change, delivered more than a hundred used incandescent light bulbs painted black in recognition of his efforts to reduce heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere. The lightbulbs were donated by people who have switched to more energy efficient compact fluorescents.

Christmas in July. (photo courtesy of Lauren K. Turnbull)

But it was also a reminder that the students – and the world – will be watching in December as Kerry, Senate Foreign Relations Chairman, is expected take a central role at the UN Climate Summit in Copenhagen.

“The idea is that as the polar ice caps melt, Santa will become the world’s most celebrated climate refugee,” explains Sally Sharrow, a junior at Tufts University. “But ultimately climate change impacts us all. We’re conveying that message in an unusual way – even though it’s a very serious issue – because we’re young, and this is an issue that the youth of this state care passionately about.”

Workers at Evergreen Solar, Inc. put together solar panels in the panel fab area at the Devens facility. (Globe photo/Joanne Rathe)

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

Evergreen Solar, a clean-tech coup for the state when it opened a 24-hour manufacturing plant last year in Devens, is making so much noise neighbors near it can’t sleep.

“It's like a jet engine whir,’’ said Bill Carroll, of Harvard who is one of an estimated 10 families who have complained about the noise over the last four months. The sounds vary with the winds and weather, he said, and can disturb people in their yards. “We want to hear birds not machinery.”

No one argues that the solar-panel plant, which stretches longer than three football fields, is violating noise thresholds.

But there is a battle over when it will be fixed.

Evergreen Solar officials say the racket is coming from at least six different sources – and they are spending more than $1 million to fix the problem. However, the company says it needs to order custom-made equipment, the last of which will be installed in September.

By Stephen Smith, Globe Staff

Since Memorial Day, more than 130 Massachusetts beaches have faced temporary swimming closures as heavy rains overwhelm sewer systems and sweep pet waste and other detritus into coastal waters and inland lakes, state public health authorities reported this morning.

It is the highest number of late-spring and early-summer beach closings in any year since at least 2002, and represents more closings for the period than in 2002 through 2005 combined.

"When you look at it on a year-by-year basis and you look at this year, 2009, it's just remarkable," said Suzanne Condon, director of the Bureau of Environmental Health at the state Department of Public Health. "It's pretty amazing, and it's obviously because of the rain."

Green Mountain College junior Ryan Dixon guides oxen while junior Casey Martin drives a cutting machines (GMC photo)

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

Many people I know are attempting to reduce their carbon footprint when it comes to food. A few try to only buy locally grown vegetables to avoid emissions from transporting their salad ingredients from far away. An acquaintance has given up beef because its production gives off more greenhouse gases than chicken. A few people I’ve met are actually trying to grow all their own food.

Green Mountain College in Poultney Vermont, is taking it all a step further – attempting to see if its 24-acre Cerridwen Farm organic operations – from potato picking to cow milking – can be done with no reliance on fossil fuels whatsoever.

The four-year liberal arts college has given up tractors in favor of oxen to plow and hay. It’s installed solar collectors atop a barn roof to heat water for its two-cow dairy operation. Carbon dioxide emitted from the metabolisms of 80 chickens is shared with a next door greenhouse where CO2 levels can dip during the winter.

And the farm – through an intensive new Farm Life Ecology summer class that includes students from other colleges – has an influx of manual labor which doesn’t use fossil fuels at all.

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

Last week, I wrote a story about the state opening the door for dozens of wind turbines – and likely many more – to be built in state waters that stretch three miles from shore.

A worker in Salisbury checks a buoy recently that will float over a device that will generate energy from waves. (Joanne Rathe/Globe photo)

Meanwhile, the New England Marine Renewable Energy Center is busy getting ready for the next generation of energy from the sea by hoping to use a rectangular ocean swath south of Martha's Vineyard as a testing ground.

The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth-based center just received $950,000 from the US Department of Energy to develop better technologies for offshore wind, waves and tides. The center is already working with the towns of Edgartown and Nantucket to develop a tidal energy project in Muskeget Channel between the two islands known for its fierce currents.

But center researchers also hope to get permission to use a piece of ocean from the channel extending 30 miles south for energy entrepreneurs to use as an experiment center at the full mercy of deep waters and tough ocean conditions.

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

Ten years ago today, a demolition crew in Augusta, Maine punched a hole through a 160-year-old dam on the Kennebec River and made history.

A torrent of water passed through an opening in the Edwards Dam on the Kennebec River in Augusta 10 years after heavy equipment began tearing it down. (AP photo)

It was the first time that the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ruled that the ecological value of a free-flowing river was greater than the economic value of a dam – and marked the end of a bitter decade-long fight over the dam’s fate.

Now, the Kennebec, one of Maine’s great rivers, has come back to life. Without the dam’s barrier, 2 million alewives returned to the river this year, making it one of the largest river herring runs in the United States. Anglers are increasing fishing for bass and other fish. Atlantic sturgeon – the Kennebec’s largest fish that can grow up to 10 feet in length – are regularly seen leaping out of the river from Augusta to Waterville during their mid-summer spawning migration. Canoe and kayakers regularly paddle along the scenic waterway.

The dam removal was touted at the time as a symbol of a new era, one where dams would face increasing scrutiny over their environmental damage. Environmentalists predicted dozens – perhaps more – dams would be ordered removed when their licenses expired.

((AP Photo/Toby Talbot)

By Beth Daley
Globe Staff

My friend Polly called from Corinth, Vermont on Sunday: Was it sunny where I was? That would be a big no in Providence where I live. And no again a few hours later when I was driving into Hyannis.

She moved on, calling other friends, desperate to find where she could bask – even for a few minutes – in the sun’s warm rays.

Perseverance paid off. Polly found sun, briefly, in St. Johnsbury. And then, of course, the rain started falling.

Perhaps the most annoying part of this endless gray backdrop New England has been painted with is that, with little warning, the sun briefly appears. Tourists coming back from Martha’s Vineyard yesterday bragged they caught a few minutes of rays – as if ten minutes of sun was some sort of New England event that merits celebrating.

On Nantucket, where I worked yesterday, the sun poked through at 7:12 a.m. and then for the afternoon ferry ride back to the mainland – and even part of the drive back to Providence. Yet by 5:30 p.m. the rain started spitting.

(Globe staff photo/Pat Greenhouse)

By Beth Daley
GLOBE STAFF
New England fishing officials yesterday overhauled the way many fishermen will do their jobs in hopes of reviving the region's imperiled populations of cod and flounder and its distressed fishing industry.

The new system is likely to replace a Byzantine scheme that regulates fishermen's catch through strict limits on how many fish they can bring to port and how many days they are allowed to venture out to sea -- a number that has dwindled to 20 days a year for many fishermen.

Instead, groups of fishermen will be able to form cooperatives that would be allotted a total amount of fish to catch each year. Then fishermen in each cooperative, or "sector", would work out among themselves how to divvy up this quota.

The idea is to give fishermen more flexibility, allowing them to avoid dangerous weather and end the practice of throwing dead fish overboard if they catch more than permitted. There are already two sectors operating on Cape Cod, and the new rules, set to take effect next May, will create 17 more in New England for sea captains who go after cod, flounder and other bottom-dwelling species.

"It's a real step in the right direction,'' said Patricia Kurkul, regional administrator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fisheries service. In the future, "I see sustainable fisheries and fishermen in a better position to make business decisions without the restrictions" they are now under.

The effort -- of which many fishermen remain skeptical -- is the nation's most ambitious attempt to reign in overfishing by giving groups of fishermen more of a stake in the health of fish stocks. And while voluntary, the program is likely to push most of the region's estimated 600 operating boats into cooperatives. Yesterday, on the last day of a three-day meeting in Portland, the New England Fishery Management Council halved the number of days fishermen who choose not to join cooperatives can go to sea.

"We are being forced into sectors,'' said Joe Orlando, a Gloucester fish captain for 35 years. He said he is joining a sector because staying out of one means being even more restricted. "There is not enough fish to go around and a lot of people are going to (leave the business). We don't want this."

(AP Photo)
By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

Every year, hundreds of federally protected humpback whales off New England delight thousands of whale watchers who flock off the coast to see the marine mammals frolic and feed.

But now, some of them – or their relations – may be in danger with a request by Greenland to kill up to 50 humpback whales over the next five years for aboriginal subsistence according to the Plymouth-based Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS)

A humpback delighting whale watchers off Cape Cod (Globe file photo)

Today, the US chair of the International Whaling Commission meeting in Portugal postponed a vote on the contentious issue until a special meeting later this year – a move, the Conservation Society says, that was designed to avoid a vote that would have likely rejected Greenland’s request. A similar request by the country to kill humpbacks was denied last year.

At issue are how many whales the Greenland aboriginal population needs to live on, according to news reports. Denmark, which made the request for Greenland, a semi-autonomous territory, says they underestimated the amount of meat they can get from fin and minke whales aboriginal populations are already allowed to kill. So they need humpback meat to meet the needs of the population - about 730 tons.

Yet conservation groups say this is a thinly veiled attempt to kill more whales for commercial value – not aboriginal subsistence. The Whale and Dolphin Society says its doesn’t object to aboriginal whale hunting but says the country didn’t even catch their allowed quota for minke and fin whales and have reports of whale meat being sold in supermarkets to the general population and tourists.

Will the turbines replace the coal plants? (AP photo)

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff
I hear it all the time: Get rid of the coal plants. Wind power can supply most of the world’s energy needs.

But can it?

A team at Harvard University says, at least in theory, yes. Reporting in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the researchers, led by Michael McElroy, examined global wind resources and determined that a super-connected network of 2.5 megawatt wind turbines could meet global electricity demands – even if they only operated at 20 percent capacity.

Sectioning the globe into approximately 1,275 square mile segments, the team analyzed wind speeds every six hours and non-urban, non-forested and non-ice covered areas where turbines could realistically be built.

They determined that the contiguous U.S., for example, can get more than 16 times the energy it now consumes from an array of turbines. China could see an 18-fold increase compared to 2005 consumption. And the bulk of it would be supplied by land-based wind turbines. The rest could be gotten from offshore larger turbines with 50 miles from shore.

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

You probably have experienced it these last few dreary weeks: Complaints about the weather that radiate into everything else under the sun. Friends and family tell me they are depressed - and not only because they can’t garden or go to the beach. A general gloominess is pervading their lives. They don't feel like working out. A friend of mine who adores cooking says she is getting take-out every night.

Only a glimmer of sun, they say, will chase the dark moods away.

Yet another rainy day in Boston recently (Globe photo/David Ryan)

Will it?

We have all have heard about seasonal affective disorder – aka winter doldrums that can last months that bright lights are supposed to help cure. And research shows that people who suffer from depression are hit particularly hard by long spates of rainy and cloudy weather.

But cloudy days, it turns out, can bring even the most cheery person down. In one 1980s experiment, Illinois residents were called on the telephone on cloudy and sunny days and asked, in general, how satisfied they were with their lives. Those under gloomy skies reported less life satisfaction. Interestingly, however, when respondents were asked to explicitly consider the weather first, their satisfaction went up, possibly because they realized the cloudy weather was clouding their perceptions.

There are other reasons to be in evil spirits in the rain. Last year, Aberdeen University researchers found that dismal weather made it harder for people to lose weight – and linked it to low levels of vitamin D that is produced in skin when exposed to sunlight.

Only a few years ago, any wind turbine that was built in New England was big news. But these days – with the signature white blades beginning to whirl next to an increasing number of schools and businesses, the solitary turbines are simply becoming a part of the landscape.

But this isn’t true for industrial wind farms. Concerns about aesthetics, noise and bird kills have stalled the proposed Nantucket Sound 130-turbine project - the poster child for opposition - but several other land-based projects are on hold for the same reasons from the Berkshires to Maine.

That’s why it's worth noting that New Hampshire’s first commercial scale wind farm is being dedicated today, some 30 miles north of Keene in the Southwest portion of the Granite State. The 12 turbines are producing enough electricity to power about 10,000 homes.

According to local news accounts, the project – not unexpectedly – has been the subject of some controversy. But the farm, on a private property’s ridgeline, is up and running in full view of travelers on Route 10.

Built by Iberdrola Renewables Inc., a subsidiary of the Spanish energy company Iberdrola, the project took five years to complete. The company has several other projects in the pipeline in New England – including the controversial Hoosac wind project in Florida and Monroe that’s been tied up in legal fights and permitting for eight years and Vermont’s Deerfield Wind project that just received a certificate of public good from the Vermont Public Service Board.

It's going to be interesting to see how the wind farm wars play out on our landscape in the next decade. Of course, there are good and bad places for wind farms. But where they ultimately will be built - and how many - will define New England's role in coming years in the renewable energy revolution.

By Beth Daley Globe Staff

The mayors of Melrose and Medford, joined by a group of citizens, are suing state environmental officials, seeking to overturn a recent decision that would allow construction of an office and residential development adjacent to the Middlesex Fells Reservation without a full environmental review.

Woodland Road in the Fells (David Kamerman/Globe photo)

The lawsuit is the latest move in a nine-year battle over the Gutierrez Company’s attempt to build “Langwood Commons” -- 405 housing units and 225,000 square feet of office space on the site of an old hospital complex in Stoneham surrounded by the state park. Opponents say increased traffic from the redevelopment would cause scenic parkways to be transformed into highway-like roads.

The plaintiffs accuse the state of failing to use its authority to require the developer to apply for state permits to perform roadwork needed because of increased traffic from the project. Such a state permit would have triggered a full environmental review. The group filed a notice of intent to sue -- a legal requirement before the suit is actually filed -- this week. State Environmental Secretary Ian Bowles, state Department of Conservation and Recreation Commissioner Richard Sullivan and the Gutierrez Co. cqare named in the notice.

“They could have interpreted the law any way they wanted to and they interpreted it the wrong way," said Melrose Mayor Rob Dolan. He said the state’s decision takes away the public's right to review the project's impact. “It’s not acceptable.”

State officials have said they had little legal authority to require the company to undergo an environmental review. Instead, they worked out a deal with the developer to pay the state $1.8 million for two rotaries and other traffic changes needed as a result of the proposed project. And they said they were fixing rules to broaden their legal authority in such cases.

"We are reviewing the Notice of Intent to Sue, but should this claim go to court, we are confident that the Secretary's decision on Langwood Commons will be upheld," said Robert Keough, spokesman for the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs.

Plaintiffs said in interviews the $1.8 million deal smacked of backdoor politics, one that will result in no public input into how to preserve the Fells natural setting.

“It is not acceptable for the developers to evade proper environmental oversight by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, nor for the state to allow evasion of the review process," said David Hoff, board chairman of the Friends of the Fells advocacy group, which is also part of the suit.

The red numbers flash past faster than you can count, ticking off the ever-growing number of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere.

The carbon counter, which can be seen on a nearly 70-foot digital billboard outside of Penn Station in New York or online here, was created using measurements developed by scientists at MIT in partnership with Deutsche Bank.

Deutsche is sponsoring a "Know the Number" campaign to educate people about greenhouse gases and their effect on the environment.

The Malden City Council voted 10-0 this week to place a trash tax repeal on the ballot in November, just a few months after it was enacted.

Bob Miller, head of Malden Taxpayers for Accountability, the group leading the repeal drive, called the vote a vindication for city residents.

"The people win, because we got it on the ballot," he said.

Read more of the story here.

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

If there is a more scrutinized, despised chemical than bisphenol A in the country right now, I haven’t heard of it.

And now, Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal is investigating whether industry officials are using “fear tactics, political manipulation and misleading marketing” to fight regulation of the chemical used in hundreds of everyday products, from baby bottles to canned food.

The chemical, if you haven’t heard yet, can leach out of bottles and be ingested by people. It has come under growing criticism because of numerous animal studies in recent years that suggest low levels of BPA could cause developmental problems in fetuses and young children, among other ill effects.

Mothers at a March statehouse rally to urge Massachusetts officials to warn the public about BPA (Bill Greene/Globe photo)

Blumenthal is focusing in on an industry private meeting that was held in late May. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel obtained a summary memo of the discussion, http://www.jsonline.com/watchdog/watchdogreports/46510647.html which included possible strategies to better market BPA, including getting a pregnant woman to serve as a spokeswoman – the “holy grail” according to the memo. Attendees also said they doubted they could find a scientist to serve as a spokesman.

Blumenthal wrote a letter yesterday to companies and associations that attended the meeting, including, Coca-Cola Company, Crown Packaging Inc., Alcoa, Del Monte Foods and the American Chemistry Council asking them for details about it.

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

The federal government dramatically extended protection for the imperiled wild Atlantic salmon in Maine yesterday, declaring that the few remaining sportfish in the Penobscot River, Kennebec and Androscoggin rivers and their tributaries are endangered.

A wild Atlantic salmon raised in a Maine hatchery (AP file photo)

The move comes nine years after the federal government declared the fish – once such a part of American legend that one was delivered to the US president each year – endangered in eight Down East Maine rivers.

And, like then, the listing is promising to spark a political war with state officials saying the decision will unnecessarily harm industries along the rivers that will have to undergo arduous environmental reviews.

“This federal action ignores Maine’s strong track record in species management and our need for a flexible approach,” Maine Governor John Baldacci said in a statement. He said he is exploring legal actions to challenge the listing. “The extreme approach chosen by the federal government hamstrings the State’s ability to use creative conservation efforts that have been successful in the past.”

The federal government said they were expanding the endangered listing to more rivers because genetic tests have shown they are part of the same population group as the Down East salmon listed nine years ago. And while the Penobscot River fish seem to have been doing marginally better in the last two years, the overall number of Atlantic salmon that return each year to state rivers remain dismal.

“Legend has it you could once walk across these rivers on the backs of salmon,’’ said U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Acting Director Rowan Gould. “If we are ever going to recover this iconic species…we need to protect it now in Maine.”

The listing means that it will be illegal for a fisherman to intentionally catch an Atlantic salmon – or even “harass” the creatures. But the listing also protects the “critical habitat” of salmon – the area needed to help the fish population survive and recover. That habitat is contained in about 12,000 miles of rivers, streams and estuaries and about 300 square miles of lakes in Maine.'

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

The federal government dramatically extended protection for the imperiled wild Atlantic salmon in Maine yesterday, declaring that the few remaining sportfish in the Penobscot River, Kennebec and Androscoggin rivers and their tributaries are endangered.

A wild Atlantic salmon raised in a Maine hatchery (AP file photo)

The move comes nine years after the federal government declared the fish – once such a part of American legend that one was delivered to the US president each year – endangered in eight Down East Maine rivers.

And, like then, the listing is promising to spark a political war with state officials saying the decision will unnecessarily harm industries along the rivers that will have to undergo arduous environmental reviews.

“This federal action ignores Maine’s strong track record in species management and our need for a flexible approach,” Maine Governor John Baldacci said in a statement. He said he is exploring legal actions to challenge the listing. “The extreme approach chosen by the federal government hamstrings the State’s ability to use creative conservation efforts that have been successful in the past.”

The federal government said they were expanding the endangered listing to more rivers because genetic tests have shown they are part of the same population group as the Down East salmon listed nine years ago. And while the Penobscot River fish seem to have been doing marginally better in the last two years, the overall number of Atlantic salmon that return each year to state rivers remain dismal.

“Legend has it you could once walk across these rivers on the backs of salmon,’’ said U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Acting Director Rowan Gould. “If we are ever going to recover this iconic species…we need to protect it now in Maine.”

The listing means that it will be illegal for a fisherman to intentionally catch an Atlantic salmon – or even “harass” the creatures. But the listing also protects the “critical habitat” of salmon – the area needed to help the fish population survive and recover. That habitat is contained in about 12,000 miles of rivers, streams and estuaries and about 300 square miles of lakes in Maine.'

By Beth Daley, Globe Staff

The federal government dramatically extended protection for the imperiled wild Atlantic salmon in Maine yesterday, declaring that the few remaining sportfish in the Penobscot River, Kennebec and Androscoggin rivers and their tributaries are endangered.

A wild Atlantic salmon raised in a Maine hatchery (AP file photo)

The move comes nine years after the federal government declared the fish – once such a part of American legend that one was delivered to the US president each year – endangered in eight Down East Maine rivers.

And, like then, the listing is promising to spark a political war with state officials saying the decision will unnecessarily harm industries along the rivers that will have to undergo arduous environmental reviews.

“This federal action ignores Maine’s strong track record in species management and our need for a flexible approach,” Maine Governor John Baldacci said in a statement. He said he is exploring legal actions to challenge the listing. “The extreme approach chosen by the federal government hamstrings the State’s ability to use creative conservation efforts that have been successful in the past.”

The federal government said they were expanding the endangered listing to more rivers because genetic tests have shown they are part of the same population group as the Down East salmon listed nine years ago. And while the Penobscot River fish seem to have been doing marginally better in the last two years, the overall number of Atlantic salmon that return each year to state rivers remain dismal.

“Legend has it you could once walk across these rivers on the backs of salmon,’’ said U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Acting Director Rowan Gould. “If we are ever going to recover this iconic species…we need to protect it now in Maine.”

The listing means that it will be illegal for a fisherman to intentionally catch an Atlantic salmon – or even “harass” the creatures. But the listing also protects the “critical habitat” of salmon – the area needed to help the fish population survive and recover. That habitat is contained in about 12,000 miles of rivers, streams and estuaries and about 300 square miles of lakes in Maine.'