Service will be provided by trains capable of running off batteries as well as electric catenaries. The hybrid service will enable the trains to run through tunnels and other areas without needing to build overhead wires.
Bruce Mohl
Bruce Mohl oversees the production of content and edits reports, along with carrying out his own reporting with a particular focus on transportation, energy, and climate issues.
He previously worked at the Boston Globe, where he spent nearly 30 years in a wide variety of positions covering business and politics. He covered the Massachusetts State House and served as the Globe’s State House bureau chief in the late 1980s. He also reported for the Globe’s Spotlight Team, winning a Loeb award in 1992 for coverage of conflicts of interest in the state’s pension system. He served as the Globe’s political editor in 1994 and went on to cover consumer issues for the newspaper.
Bruce is a graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.
Posted inEnvironment
Will Mass. follow the lead of New York on climate change?
In 2019, New York set mandates calling for 70 percent of the state’s electricity to come from renewable sources by 2030 and net zero emissions by 2040. New York lawmakers also approved the creation of a congestion pricing plan for New York City that would assess a toll of as much as $15 on vehicles entering Manhattan south of 60th Street.
Posted inEnergy
Debris from broken turbine getting harder to find
Roger Martella, chief sustainability officer for GE Vernona, the manufacture of the wind turbines, said the company is preparing to remove what remains of the broken turbine blade with the help of a company called Resolve Marine, whose employees are on site working out of New Bedford.
Posted inEnergy
GE suspects ‘manufacturing deviation’ with turbine blade
Scott Reese, the CEO of GE Vernova, said there is no indication of an engineering design flaw with the turbine blade. He said the company is re-inspecting all of the 150 blades that have been manufactured at a plant in Gaspe, Canada, to see if the problem occurred with other blades.
Posted inImmigration
Healey keeps pulling up the emergency shelter system’s welcome mat
“Massachusetts is out of shelter space, and we simply cannot afford the current size of this system,” said Gov. Maura Healey.
Posted inEnergy
Should Mass. go big or small with upcoming offshore wind procurement?
Barton acknowledged supply chain concerns and ongoing economic uncertainty, but said the economics of offshore wind are unlikely to change any time soon and climate change dictates acting now and going big.
Posted inEnergy
Most of the rest of damaged turbine blade falls into ocean
Nantucket residents, who turned out in force at a Select Board meeting Wednesday evening, some of them describing the initial blade damage and resulting debris as an environmental disaster, knew more bad news was likely coming.
Posted inEnergy
House, Senate far apart on clean energy procurements
In other key areas the bills differ quite dramatically, which could complicate efforts to reach a deal between the House and Senate before the legislative session ends on July 31. Less than two weeks remain.
Posted inEnergy
Most of turbine blade left hanging; wind farm shut down
Some larger pieces of the blade fell into the water and were retrieved. A lot of smaller pieces of foam and fiberglass were washing ashore on Nantucket on Tuesday.
Posted inHousing
BlueHub court battle shifts to Legislature
The legislative push comes as the legal battle in Suffolk Superior Court appears to be nearing a resolution, with both sides seeking summary judgments that they are in the right. Both sides can point to customers on their side, some saying they were ripped off and others who insist BlueHub helped save their house.
Posted inEnergy
Vineyard Wind 1 turbine experiences undisclosed damage
The developers provided few details about what happened. The incident is the second involving the new GE Haliade-X 13-megawatt turbines, which are some of the largest in the world.
Posted inPolitics
Political Notebook: Flanagan may face challenge | No month off for task force
State regulators earlier this year accused Flanagan of repeatedly misleading them as they tried to find out who was behind a phony mailer sent to voters in 2022, before he confessed it was him.
Posted inTransportation
MassDOT reverses course, includes $243m for I-90 Allston project in capital plan
The explanations left many observers scratching their heads, and some wondering whether the MassDOT staff simply forgot to include funding in the capital investment plan for one of the Healey administration’s highest transportation priorities.
Posted inEnergy
DPU unveils plan to speed up municipal electricity aggregation approvals
Municipal aggregation plans allow cities and towns to negotiate electricity rates on behalf of their residents. The plans have gained tremendous popularity as the cost of electricity has risen and the aggregation efforts have often yielded lower prices than the basic service provided by utilities and the rates of retail suppliers.
Posted inEnergy
Barnstable at the center of offshore wind debate
Many in town are asking why a residential beach community has become the onshore epicenter of the offshore wind business in Massachusetts.
Posted inTransportation
Audit faults MBTA for CharlieCard misuse by transit ambassadors
The ambassadors, who work for a private contractor that operates under the name Block By Block, help passengers buy tickets and navigate stations and also serve as the T’s eyes and ears monitoring safety hazards and maintenance needs inside the subway system.
Posted inRace/Racism
DiZoglio slams state agency on minority outreach
“If we are serious about expanding opportunities for underrepresented populations, we must do better,” State Auditor Diana DiZoglio said in a statement.
Posted inEnergy
Watching the sausage get made on Beacon Hill
The proposal didn’t follow the traditional legislative route – getting filed as a bill, vetted in a hearing before a committee, and then moving on to the full Legislature. Instead, the Healey administration broached the idea earlier this year but actual language didn’t emerge publicly until a climate bill was reported out of the Senate Ways and Means Committee midway through June.
Posted inHealth Care
Medicaid enrollment drops by 383,000 from COVID high
The state’s combined Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program had nearly 2.04 million members at the end of May, according to new data. That’s about 15 percent fewer than when Massachusetts set out in spring 2023 on a gargantuan, federally mandated campaign to decide who qualifies for the subsidized insurance coverage for the first time since the pandemic.
Posted inCourts
SJC dismisses challenges to MCAS ballot question info
The challenges, one from supporters and one from opponents of the question, took issue with the title and one-sentence statements summarizing what yes and no votes would mean. Both challenges claimed the information provided was misleading because not enough details were provided.
Posted inTransportation
MassDOT’s draft capital plan contains no money for I-90 Allston construction
The I-90 Allston project is scheduled to receive $62.08 million for design and permitting over the next five years but nothing for construction over that period or in the future.
Posted inEnergy
Senate considering new model for developing clean energy
The senator said the proposal is essentially a new business model for developing clean energy, one that does away with the current plodding procurement process involving the Legislature and utilities and instead gives the governor near-total control.
Posted inImmigration
Healey telling migrants Mass. shelters are full
“This trip is an important opportunity to meet with families arriving in the US and the organizations that work with them at the border to make sure they have accurate information about the lack of shelter space in Massachusetts,” said Emergency Assistance Director General Scott Rice, who is leading the five-member team.
Posted inTransportation
Moulton again is championing the idea of a ‘Rail Link’
“We are not going to fix Massachusetts transportation problems by thinking small. We’ve got to think big,” Congressman Seth Moulton said on The Codcast. “I mean it just makes no sense – the system we have today. So it has to be transformed, and if Massachusetts is ever going to fix our infamous transportation problems, this is the approach we need to take.”