March 2022 Environmental Action Update

Municipal Solar Mapping Project:  The Fall 2021 of the training was hugely successful with 12 municipalities completing the 5-session course using Scenic Hudson’s How to Solar Mapping Toolkit and Worksheet.  This tool helps empower municipalities to take a leadership role in implementing the goals of NY’s Climate Act.  The Spring 2022 Session will begin on March 16 for five alternating Weds. evenings at 7 p.m.  Outreach will focus on priority communities and members of Town Boards, Planning Boards, Environmental guyCommissions, Economic Development Committees and Climate Smart Committees in the Mid-Hudson Region.  Please ask your municipality to participate.  Click here for details and the training schedule:  Please contact: mannajo@clearwater.org for more details.  Click Here to Register

Pipeline Safety Expert to Speak at DOB:  On March 17, the NYS Decommissioning Oversight Board will hold its second meeting. The meeting will feature pipeline safety expert, Rick Kurprewitz, who will present on the risks associated with the gas pipelines that run underneath and adjacent to  Indian Point and how it should be factored into the decommissioning of the plant.  There will be a public comment portion for community members to ask questions and offer comments. . The meeting will run from 6-9 p.m. and will be virtual. 

Details will be sent out once made available.

Newburgh Residents Needed:  Newburgh is encouraging residents to allow scientists to study the relationship between PFAS exposure and health in a study conducted by the NYS Department of Health and SUNY Albany.  They are looking for 500 adults and 150 children to participate who drank Newburgh water between 2005 and 2016.  Please let friends from Newburgh know and contact matt@clearwater.org for information on how they can become part of the study.

Climate Action Council seeks comments on Draft Scoping Plan:  The Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA), which was signed into law in 2019, is one of the most ambitious climate laws in the world.  The law created the Climate Action Council (CAC), which was tasked with developing a draft scoping plan that serves as an initial framework for how the State will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and achieve net-zero emissions, increase renewable energy usage, and ensure climate justice.  On December 20, 2921 the Council released the Draft Scoping Plan for public comment, which will be due in May (date TBD).  Clearwater will be providing comments.  If you are interested in helping with this important work or  learning more, please contact Manna or Matt.

In August of last year, the IPCC issued a “Code Red for Humanity” that human activity is changing the climate in unprecedented and sometimes irreversible ways, warning of increasingly extreme heatwaves, droughts and flooding, and a key temperature limit being broken in just over a decade.  In addition to the melting of glacial ice in Greenland and the Arctic, in December a NY Times article focused on the melting of polar ice in Antarctica and provides an interesting and very dire analysis of the climate crisis.  

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/12/13/climate/antarctic-climate-change.html
These reports underscore the urgent need to take climate action, most immediately to transition to a renewable energy economy, with storage and efficiency – starting locally in your municipality.

NYS DEC Hudson River Estuary Program:  Climate-adaptive Communities in the Hudson River Estuary: Resilience Actions from Climate Smart Communities   Given the fact that sea level will rise and weather events will become more extreme, this excellent program will help municipalities to plan for and become more resistant.  Clearwater will provide outreach and support to waterfront and priority communities. 

Events of Interest:

Wed., March 9, 8-9:30 p.m.:  Nuclear is Not a Climate Solution:  Join the Affected Communities and Allies Working Group of the Nuclear Ban Treaty Collaborative will host a discussion on the devastating impacts of nuclear testing in the Pacific, the Fukushima nuclear disaster, and the dangers of parading nuclear energy as a solution to the climate crisis.  Click Here to Register

Fri., March 11: Anniversary of Fukushima: https://www.facebook.com/groups/C.A.N.CoalitionAgainstNukes/permalink/5036234133130324/

Wed., March 16, 3-4 p.m.: A Tour of Native New York with Evan Pritchard: Join Evan Pritchard, founder of Center for Algonquin Culture, on a virtual journey through Algonquin Civilization in southern New York in the time before European contact. Evan will lead viewers on a walk through native life using detailed maps of the Hudson Valley and beyond he created over 10+ years of research and interviews. Songs and ceremony will help weave a tapestry of stories to situate attendees in place and time.  Click Here to Register

Wed., March 30 at 3 p.m.:  World Wide Climate Teach-in.  Join educators and activists for a Teach-In in your community creating a dialogue that inspires the action we need to solve the climate crisis before 2030. The pressing reality of climate change requires us to urgently engage with two ideas: (1) time is very short, and (2) realistic solutions are possible.  The coming ten years will be the most decisive in history, not only for us and our children, but in fact for every human being and living creature who will walk the face of the earth from now until the end of time.  Click Here to Register