A WELL-FINANCED, industry-led effort has been insidiously recasting burning trees for energy as a climate solution. Massachusetts residents and ratepayers have overwhelmingly chosen to support clean energy – but greenwashing by this polluting industry threatens to undermine our clean energy policies and squander both our ratepayer dollars and the public trust. Now the Massachusetts Legislature […]
Mary S. Booth
Posted inOpinion
Baker’s new biomass rules are step backward
HERE’S A QUICK tip for greening our heat and power: if you need to set it on fire, it isn’t clean. That should be the guiding principle for the state’s new Commission on Clean Heat, which could finally shed some light on a sector rife with methane leaks, oil spills, and wood smoke. Skeptics may […]
Posted inOpinion
Despite his claims, science is not on Vic Gatto’s side
VIC GATTO has been a tireless campaigner for the 42-megawatt biomass power plant in East Springfield that his company wants to build over widespread community opposition. But in his effort to ostensibly dispel “public misinformation” about the proposed Palmer Renewable Energy plant (“Biomass Plant COO Says Science is on His Side,” Feb. 27, 2021), he is simply […]
Posted inOpinion
Get ready for another biomass battle
REMEMBER THE BIG FIGHT about biomass as renewable energy in Massachusetts in the mid-2000s? We’re in the middle of another one. About 10 years ago, the Massachusetts Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) still classified what were essentially tree-burning power plants as renewable, making them eligible for lucrative renewable energy subsidies. At that time, three large biomass […]