LWV DelCo Environmental Clearinghouse
Delaware County Environmental Clearinghouse
Haverford Climate Action is calling on Delco residents to take inaction! Leave your leaves! Did you know that if you leave some or all of the leaves in your yard they will break down naturally over time and enrich your soil? They also provide habitat for pollinators and small creatures. Read more for a link to see what you can do to help wildlife survive and thrive in your leaves at a time when insects are experiencing mass extinction.
Since taking office, Gov. Josh Shapiro has taken no meaningful action to promote clean energy or mitigate climate change. Physicians for Social Reponsibility is asking Gov. Shapiro not to give away the store to the fossil fuel industry and big tech data centers in the name of “energy reliability.”
Fracking promised to reduce electric and natural gas prices for Pennsylvania’s residents, but prices have increased instead. Read this report by Inside Climate News reporters Kiley Bense and Dan Gearino to find out why.
A bill introduced in Philadelphia City Council Sept. 18 would prohibit the city from contracting with companies that incinerate its trash and recyclables. Currently about one-third of Philadelphia’s waste is sent to the Reworld (formerly Covanta) incinerator in Chester. Most of Delaware County’s municipal waste is also burned in the incinerator.
The Delaware County Council has accepted the county Sustainability Commission’s zero waste plan that promises to work towards an 82% reduction in solid waste, increase the efficiency of the county’s waste disposal practices and reduce costs.
The EPA released a draft rule Sept. 12 to end its long-standing greenhouse gas reporting program for 8,000 emitters, such as power plants and iron and steel manufacturers, and to suspend reporting for the fossil fuel industry until 2034. These are the chief sources of information about methane and CO2 emissions, major contributors to global warming.
The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission is involved in a process to allow electric grid operator PJM to charge its ratepayers across 13 states an estimated $70 million a year to keep the Eddystone oil-and-gas power plant operating. The DOE ordered the plant, on the brink of retirement, to keep running for two three-month periods this summer and fall and it is unclear whether the order will be made permanent. The Trump Administration plans to order Forty coal plants across the country to keep operating as well.
As environmentalists prepare for Sun Day, Sept. 21 (see article below), famed environmental guru and Sun Day founder Bill McKibben has an idea for doomsday preppers: instead of storing oil and gas, which goes bad or runs out after a couple of years, think about solar. Solar panels last for far longer and the energy can be delivered right to your roof, no drilling or refining necessary.
Join PennFuture and Conservation Voters of Pennsylvania in an environment lobby day Sept. 29 at the capitol in Harrisburg. With the federal government clawing back,funding and cancelling clean energy programs, we have to depend on state government more than ever. Anyone can join. Fill out the registration form at bottom.
