by | Oct 18, 2023 11:48 am | Comments (12)
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Lynn Stoddard, executive director of Sustainable CT, speaks at East Rock press conference.
New Haven is the first and only Connecticut city to win gold — for sustainability, at least.
by | Oct 18, 2023 8:34 am | Comments (15)
Thomas Breen file photo
Kiana Flores, at a 2019 climate rally outside City Hall.
As a Co-Op high school student, Kiana Flores helped convince the Board of Alders to pass a climate emergency resolution.
As a Yale college student, she’ll soon have a chance to put such eco-friendly policy priorities into practice — after she runs unopposed to become the next alder representing downtown’s Ward 1.
Continue reading ‘Climate Activist On Tap To Be Next Ward 1 Alder’
by | Oct 13, 2023 12:22 pm | Comments (5)
Thomas Breen file photo
Albertus Magnus' parking lot solar array: Just the beginning.
Solar panel canopies are coming to the parking lots of Hill Central and Beecher schools, as part of a city school district effort to become more climate friendly and energy efficient.
by | Oct 4, 2023 8:25 am | Comments (2)
Paul Bass Photo
Kimberly Stoner at WNHH FM.
Connecticut environmentalists are waging a years-long quest to convince voters to pass an ERA — and not your mother’s ERA.
Continue reading ‘Climate-Change Campaigners Eye State Constitutional Amendment’
by | Sep 28, 2023 12:23 pm | Comments (11)
Thomas Breen photos
Greg Menotti, charging up his "impulse buy" Tesla ...
... at the Hotel Marcel supercharger station on Long Wharf.
Greg Menotti had a good month making money trading Tesla stock — so, as an “impulse buy,” he dropped $30,000 purchasing a name-brand electric car of his own.
by | Sep 27, 2023 3:19 pm | Comments (2)
Maya McFadden Photo
United Illuminating (UI), city officials, and small business owners kick off Small Business Energy Efficiency Campaign.
Flyer to be handed out during neighborhood canvassing.
Local small businesses looking to save money on their energy systems can also help address the climate crisis at the same time — by switching to LED lights, better sealing windows, improving insulation, adopting programmable thermostats, and other energy-efficient interventions.
So pitched city officials and representatives from United Illuminating (UI) and Southern Connecticut Gas (SCG) on Monday as they kicked off a week-long Small Business Energy Efficiency Campaign in the rain at 300 and 302 Dixwell Ave. that is designed to support some of those climate-friendly changes.
Continue reading ‘Small Biz Energy Efficiency Campaign Kicks Off In Dixwell’
by | Sep 22, 2023 8:35 am | Comments (4)
Thomas Breen photos
Alex Morquecho, Aaron Goode and Jacob Smith with Sound School's newly planted peace tree.
Alex Morquecho and Jacob Smith crouched atop a raised bed of waterfront soil to uncover the city’s latest tribute to a hoped-for world without violence, alongside a newly planted “peace tree.”
by | Sep 15, 2023 8:33 am | Comments (11)
Thomas Breen file photo
Co-Op students Shay, 14, and Shianna, 13, on their way back home to Fair Haven after Sep. 6's early dismissal.
After high heat and broken air conditioning systems sent students home early two days in a row last week, New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) Superintendent Madeline Negrón has established an “extreme temperature protocol” that considers closing school buildings if classrooms get above 80 degrees.
Next up, she plans to put together a long-awaited district preventative maintenance program.
by and | Sep 6, 2023 2:33 pm | Comments (16)
Thomas Breen photos
Svetlana Frazeur and Lenochka, heading home early on Grand.
Thomas Breen file photo
Co-Op students Shay, 14, and Shianna, 13, on their way back home to Fair Haven.
Svetlana Frazeur had to pick up her daughter Lenochka from Pre‑K at Fair Haven School at noon on Wednesday — before rushing off to retrieve her son from Benjamin Jepson School, before rushing off to her 1 p.m. shift at an ALDI’s grocery store — as early dismissals due to high heat and broken air conditioning systems shuttered schools citywide.
by | Aug 25, 2023 5:10 pm | Comments (18)
Nora Grace-Flood photos
The English Station power plant, hidden behind graffiti, back in May.
United Illuminating will have to pay up for breaking a promise to remediate a Fair Haven power plant after state utility regulators formally accused the company of mismanaging English Station — and of failing to prioritize New Haven residents over profit.
Continue reading ‘Annual Penalty OK'd For English Station Mess’
by | Aug 25, 2023 10:43 am | Comments (12)
ClimateHaven CEO Ryan Dings: “We’re an incubator, accelerator, and a convenor.”
Yale post-doc Wangbiao Guo has just received a patent for a multi-stage system that captures carbon from the air by the use of algae.
All he needs for the next step is about $500,000 to finance a pilot/prototype to begin to take the product to market — and that’s why he was enjoying an American Snappy Lager Thursday night over at 770 Chapel St.
by | Aug 25, 2023 10:19 am | Comments (19)
Paul Bass photo
An Avelo plane ...
Edward Fitzgerald Photo
... and a mid-July flood at Tweed Airport.
Climate change has emerged as a defining issue in a Morris Cove alder race, as a six-term incumbent focused on nuts-and-bolts environmental upkeep faces a challenge from an activist determined to stop an expanding airport.
by | Aug 24, 2023 4:22 pm | Comments (23)
Thomas Breen photo
Brennan, in front of supporters, in front of "climate hero" parking lot.
One of the keys to curbing local carbon emissions amid an ever-worsening climate crisis might just lie in a Newhallville parking lot on Albertus Magnus College’s campus.
Continue reading ‘Local Climate Crisis Rx: Solar On Parking’
by | Aug 23, 2023 8:20 am | Comments (1)
Brian Slattery photo
Adam Matlock.
Adam Matlock, executive director of the nonprofit Winnett Food Forest in Hamden, was moving from garden bed to garden bed with an empty bin. Soon, that bin and another one like it would be filled with fresh greens and a few tomatoes — part of the week’s harvest from a new approach to growing food that leans hard on community and sustainability.
Continue reading ‘Winnett Food Forest Grows For The Community’
by | Aug 14, 2023 12:39 pm | Comments (16)
Nora Grace-Flood photo
A seemingly new fence — and new graffiti — at English Station.
A state utility regulator cited growing graffiti and revolving project management as reasons to doubt United Illuminating’s (UI) promise to fix up a long-abandoned and toxic power plant — and as reason to fine the company over $1 million annually until the regional power company follows through on the remediation.
UI, in turn, has shot back against that proposed financial penalty, denying claims of mismanagement, refusing accountability for any vandalism of the site, and accusing the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA) of violating due process.
Continue reading ‘Annual Penalty Debated For English Station Mess’
by | Jul 25, 2023 12:41 pm | Comments (0)
Allan Appel photo
Monica Loomis sampling the Lamb's Ear.
“It feels like flannel,” said Monica Loomis of the Lamb’s Ear that Giulia Gambale had distributed to her.
Continue reading ‘Gardeners Time Travel At Pardee-Morris House’
by | Jul 21, 2023 11:45 am | Comments (47)
Travelers react to latest Tweed flood.
Laura Glesby Photo
Elicker, Abdussabur offer different takeaways at Jepsen mayoral forum.
Days after a rainstorm flooded Tweed airport and left passengers temporarily stranded, mayoral candidates conveyed varying takes on the airport’s economic value and environmental impact to its neighbors.
Continue reading ‘Sunday Storm Sparks Thursday Tweed Debate’
by | Jul 21, 2023 9:52 am | Comments (1)
Brian Slattery Photo
Skedgell: Publish or perish.
Days of smoke. Heat waves. The return of El Niño. These large-scale climate events shape our lives. But so do the people giving over their property to rewilding, the people clearing parks of invasive species, the people who take time out from their day to unplug and put their hands in a garden’s soil.
Journalist, documentary filmmaker, and musician Lindsay Skedgell wants to hear about it all. She’s starting a new journal called Heel and Hive that “explores the environmental and climate landscape of our times, our relationships to nature and ecology” — focusing on the region we live in.
by | Jul 14, 2023 1:10 pm | Comments (4)
Kian Ahmadi photo
Digging holes and planting flowers in the peanut on Friday.
Crackling thunder and a downpour of rain didn’t stop roughly 15 Westville neighbors from venturing outside Friday morning on a traffic-calming-infrastructure-beautification effort.
by | Jul 12, 2023 5:23 pm | Comments (11)
Maya McFadden file photo
Time for cleaner buses.
Every single school day, New Haven’s 314 school buses spew out pollution fouling our air, increase the risk of asthma and even cancer to students and drivers, and exacerbate global warming.
Continue reading ‘Opinion: It's Not Too Late For Clean School Buses’
by | Jul 7, 2023 1:21 pm | Comments (22)
Thomas Breen file photo
The Yale Golf Course: 800 trees coming down, 2,000 going up?
Mia Cortés Castro Photos
Alders Festa, Punzo, Ficklin, and Miller at Thursday's CSEP meeting.
Yale plans to cut down roughly 800 trees at the university’s Upper Westville golf course, and plant another 2,000 in their stead, in order to create more grassy space for hitting the links — prompting pushback from neighbors and local environmentalists about the potential harms of felling so much wood.
Continue reading ‘Timber! Yale To Fell 800 Golf-Course Trees’
by | Jul 5, 2023 2:47 pm | Comments (6)
File photo
A 2022 New Haven Climate Movement “Stop Climate Freefall” rally.
Young climate activists are calling again for the Board of Education to set aside funds for free bus passes for students to help New Haven’s public school district reduce air pollution and make it easier for students to get to and from school.
Continue reading ‘Climate Call: Free Public Bus Passes For Students’
by | Jun 30, 2023 1:34 pm | Comments (12)
Thomas Breen photo
Smokey skies overhead at Orange and Elm at 1:30 p.m.
The smoke from Canadian wildfires has plunged New Haven’s air quality to dangerous levels again, prompting the mayor to warn “sensitive groups” like older adults, pregnant women, children, and those with asthma to take extra caution.
by | Jun 30, 2023 9:15 am | Comments (3)
Contributed Photo
After decades of stasis, the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) and the Olin Corporation have taken the first steps toward remediating the Powder Farm in southern Hamden, with an eye to transforming the over 100-acre parcel of land from environmental hazard to forested public park. But there’s still a long road ahead.
Continue reading ‘Powder Farm Takes First Step Toward Remediation’
by | Jun 23, 2023 11:05 am | Comments (7)
Long Wharf Responsible Growth Plan vision of city's waterfront to-be.
Brian Slattery photo
City Plan Director Laura Brown on Thursday.
Glass-fronted first-floor retail spaces to create walkable neighborhoods and protect upper-level housing from floods. Density bonuses that encourage residential builds similar to apartment developments downtown. Street designs that calm traffic and create enough space on sidewalks for pedestrians and, say, outdoor seating for restaurants.
Those are just a few of the goals and anticipated land-use standards to be included in the city’s proposed new zoning regulations for the Long Wharf district, which top city officials unveiled in the latest effort to encourage “responsible growth” in New Haven’s mostly industrial waterfront.
Continue reading ‘City Eyes "Responsible Growth" Rezoning For Long Wharf’
