Friday, May 21, is Rhode Island Bike to Work Day, and there's a lot of fun to take part in.
From 6:30 to 9am and 4 to 6:30pm at WW1 Memorial, between Canal and South Main St in downtown Providence (near College St) there are going to be many festive activities.
The event includes speakers including at least two of our gubernatorial candidates, a free breakfast for bikers, vendors, information distribution, and afternoon music by the What Cheer? Brigade.
It is sponsored by the RI Bike Coalition and the US Open Cycling Foundation.
More information, including a map and details on "bike trains" (group rides to downtown) is available at the RI Bike Coalition web-site: www.ribike.org or www.bikeprovidence.org.
Please come and help spread the word. The event should be fun and it helps promote this most efficient from of travel.
From 6:30 to 9am and 4 to 6:30pm at WW1 Memorial, between Canal and South Main St in downtown Providence (near College St) there are going to be many festive activities.
The event includes speakers including at least two of our gubernatorial candidates, a free breakfast for bikers, vendors, information distribution, and afternoon music by the What Cheer? Brigade.
It is sponsored by the RI Bike Coalition and the US Open Cycling Foundation.
More information, including a map and details on "bike trains" (group rides to downtown) is available at the RI Bike Coalition web-site: www.ribike.org or www.bikeprovidence.org.
Please come and help spread the word. The event should be fun and it helps promote this most efficient from of travel.
What Grows On in RI Welcomes Discussion of Environmental Issues
Dear Chairperson Sosnowski and Members of the Senate Environment and Agriculture committee,
I am writing to express my opposition to 2010 -- S 2842 SUBSTITUTE A AS AMENDED:
A N A C T RELATING TO PUBLIC UTILITIES AND CARRIERS - LONG -TERM CONTRACTING STANDARD FOR RENEWABLE ENERGY
The purpose of this bill is to build a biogas fired electric plant to replace the current one in Johnston. Clearly no one in RI wants to let the methane generated in the landfill go to waste. We want to turn it into electricity and prevent the methane from going into the atmosphere where it is at least 20 times more powerful an agent of climate change than is a comparable amount of carbon dioxide. My objection is that this bill codifies an extremely inefficient way to capture the methane in our organic waste, and does it in a way that makes much more difficult the economic revitalization of our communities. There is an alternative that you should be looking at much more closely, that would do everything you want the plant in this bill to do, only better and more efficiently. The alternative is to build an anaerobic digester to process all the organic waste which then gives you much more control over the capture of methane, and leaves behind material to be composted and returned to the soil so that we can further expand RI agriculture.
According to the EPA the piping in a landfill can collect about 70% of the methane generated in the landfill while it is operating. But over the lifetime of the methane generation from organic waste in a landfill, with the piping put in place after the methane generating has already progressed, the system actually captures only about 50%, possibly as low as 40% of the total methane generated. If Rhode Island separated organic matter from trash before it was shipped to Johnston, and then had either a central or regional digesters and power plants, the efficiency could reach 80%, preventing tons of methane from reaching the atmosphere, and therefore from the same amount of waste producing more electricity. And we have the compostable material instead of leaving it in the landfill to take up space.
Agriculture is one of the big growth areas in the RI economy, and will be even more important in the future. One of the limiting factors in the revitalization of RI agriculture is a shortage of compost in the urban areas. There is one composter in RI licensed to compost food scrap currently, Earthcare Farm. Farmers all over the state buy compost from the Merners they produce a great product but the supply is limited. If RI decided to stop sending food scrap to the landfill, we could produce all the compost used in the state locally, further reducing our carbon footprint, adding resilience to our communities, and infusing our local economy.
The decision to build an electric plant dependent upon landfill emissions instead of one based on composting food scrap and other organic materials is a short sighted one, based on old technologies and mindsets. It will prevent our trash systems from moving into the 21st century and hold back our agriculture. I realize you want to take advantage of the stimulus money and generate renewable electricity, but as there is a better way with more long term benefits to RI, please hold off on this bill and do it right.
Greg Gerritt
Coordinator The Compost Project
Greater Providence Urban Agriculture Task Force
37 6th St
Providence RI 02906
401-331-0529
[email protected]
www.ProsperityForRI.org
Posted at 12:14 PM in *Event~Public Comment, Hearings, Meetings, Surveys, Energy ~ Wind, Solar, Hydro, Electric, Gas, Gaoline/Diesel, Nuclear, Renewable, Biofuel, Waste, Recycling, Contamination, Brownfields, Litter, Invasives | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: Agriculture, Anaerobic Digester, Biogas, Compost Project, Composting, Earthcare Farm, Farming, Methane, Renewable Energy, Rhode Island, RI Central Landfill, RI Environment, Urban Agriculture Task Force
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