Category Archives: All

Residential Solar Awareness Session at Hillsdale Library

Have you considered solar power as an effective and affordable option for your home and are ready to learn more about it? Join the Hillsdale Green Team for an awareness session on the options and incentives available for residential solar electric system and learn:

  • Why Choose Solar?
  • What kind of rebates are available?  NJCEP & Utilities?
  • Does solar really reduce electric bills?  By how much?
  • What are Solar Renewable Energy Certificates (sRECs)?  Why should I care?
  • I have heard about Federal Tax Credit (FTC) for solar installations. What are those? How does one apply for the FTC?
  • Does a solar installation really increase the resale value of the property?

Tuesday, May 24th @ 7:00pm
Hillsdale Public Library
509 Hillsdale Avenue, Hillsdale, NJ
Cost: Free

Governor Nominates Anti-Highlands Candidates to Highlands Council

Today is your last chance to oppose anti-Highlands nominees being appointed to the Highlands Council (which is meant to protect the Highlands). Act today – Senate Judiciary Votes on Monday!

Governor Christie is using political appointments as a de facto repeal of the Highlands Act, since he could not get the Legislature to repeal the Act. The two candidates currently presented for approval by the New Jersey Senate Judiciary Committee are:

  • Sam Race, Mayor of White Township in Western Warren County and
  • Richard Vohden, newly elected Freeholder in Sussex County.

Both have been outspoken opponents of the Highlands Act and Highland’s DEP rules. Race has publicly encouraged Warren County Freeholders to sue the State to overturn the Act. During his freeholder campaign part of Vohden’s platform was that he is charter member of Highlands Conservation Association.

The Highlands Conservation Association is a misnomer: it does not seek to protect the New Jersey Highlands. It was established to overturn New Jersey State’s Highlands Act, which does protect the Highlands. The Highlands Act can be found at
http://www.highlands.state.nj.us/njhighlands/actmaps/act/.

New Jersey Highlands Coalition Director, Julia Somers, urges, “Do not allow the Governor to play politics with our water supply!”

You can help by calling the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee today. Tell the aide who answers the phone, “I would like to ask the Senator to oppose the nominations of Sam Race and Richard Vohden to the New Jersey Highlands Council.” If asked to give your contact information please do so.

  • Senate Judiciary Committee Members:
  • Sen. Nicholas Scutari Chairman (D-22) 908-587-0404
  • Sen. John Girgenti Vice Chair (D-35) 973-427-1229
  • Sen. Kip Bateman (R-16) 908-526-3600
  • Sen. Jennifer Beck (R-12) 732-933-1591
  • Sen. Gerald Cardinale, (R-39) 201-567-2324
  • Sen. Nia Gill (D-34) 973-509-0388
  • Sen. Joseph Kyrillos (R-13) 732-671-3206
  • Sen. Raymond Lesniak (D-20) 908-624-0880
  • Sen. Kevin O’Toole (R-40) 973-237-1360
  • Sen. Paul Sarlo (D-36) 201-804-8118
  • Sen. Bob Smith (D-17) 732-752-0770
  • Sen. Brian Stack (D-33) 201-861-5091
  • Sen. Loretta Weinberg (D-37) 201-928-0100

Somers adds, “Most offensive is the fact that Mr. Race is proposed to take Tracy Carluccio’s public spot on the Council, Freeholder Vohden is proposed to take Tim Dillingham’s public spot on the Council. First, both are elected officials taking public spots on the Council; second .. . the council would have not one enviromentalist on it.

Thanks for your interest and phone calls, people!

Indian Point denied NY water permit

In a major victory for environmental advocates, New York State has ruled that outmoded cooling technology at the Indian Point nuclear power plant kills so many Hudson River fish, and consumes and contaminates so much water, that it violates the federal Clean Water Act.

. . . strongly worded letter from the Department of Environmental Conservation. . . said flatly that Indian Point’s cooling systems, even if modified in a less expensive way proposed by Entergy, “do not and will not comply” with New York’s water quality standards.

It said the power plant’s water-intake system kills nearly a billion aquatic organisms a year, including the shortnose sturgeon, an endangered species. The letter also said that radioactive material had polluted the Hudson after leaking into the groundwater.

. . . the cooling system at Indian Point Units 2 and 3 . . . take in enormous volumes of river water . . . and use it to create steam for turbines and to cool the reactors. The water is then pumped back into the Hudson, 20 or 30 degrees hotter.

Sucking so much water causes plankton, eggs and larvae to be drawn into the plant’s machinery, or entrained, and the water pressure also causes fish to be trapped, or impinged, against intake screens, the state said.

. . . An Entergy spokesman said that converting Indian Point’s cooling system would cost $1.1 billion and would require shutting both reactors down entirely for 42 weeks.

Jump to fullNew York Times article