Jan Ellen Spiegel

This morning, when state employees stroll into the Italian-style brick and glazed tile 1920 building at 79 Elm Street in Hartford that once housed an insurance company, the bronze sign over the entrance will still read Department of Environmental Protection. The guard at the front desk will do his job no differently than ever, and […]

Not the kind of news you really want to hear going into one of the biggest beach weekends of the summer: The water at Connecticut’s ocean beaches was a lot more polluted last year than it’s been in awhile. The Natural Resources Defense Council’s annual report on the nation’s marine beaches showed there were 143 […]

Supporters of the 2½-year-old Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative like to remind those who would criticize, if not outright kill, this first-in-the-nation carbon dioxide trading and reduction program of two things. First, the idea for it came from a Republican, former New York Gov. George Pataki. And second, it was modeled on a federal program to […]

SB1 – the massive omnibus energy bill that establishes Connecticut’s first energy department in three decades, creates new energy programs, alters old ones, sets ambitious policy goals and overhauls parts of the energy business – is headed for a vote in the Senate as early as today, even as its final details are unresolved. “It’s […]

It will be something of a homecoming on Tuesday at the Connecticut Clean Energy Fund when Bryan Garcia becomes its new president. But it’s looking more and more like the fund he worked at in several capacities from 2000 to 2006 is about to undergo a substantial transformation. The Fund was founded in 2000 to […]

Not long ago, Connecticut’s solar energy industry was thriving, the envy of other states. Then the state’s generous incentive program ran out of money, the legislature failed to create a sustainable alternative, and the industry found itself on the ropes. “It’s not in danger of losing momentum, it’s lost it,” said Ron French president of […]

For many homeowners, efforts to save energy start and stop with the low-hanging fruit–using fluorescent lightbulbs, for example, or caulking air leaks. Now the state is looking at a way to encourage investment in more expensive, more effective measures. “You drive around, a lot of people still have old windows in their homes,” said Sen. […]

The good news and bad news are one and the same in the Council on Environmental Quality’s 39th annual report on the state of Connecticut’s environment: Very little has changed. “The days of rapid change are over,” said Karl Wagener, CEQ’s executive director. “What we see now is very subtle changes, not all good. It’s […]

Jessie Stratton, a long-time legislator turned environmental advocate has been named to help formulate policy as the state merges environmental and energy regulation under one department. Monday was Stratton’s first day as director of policy development for the DEP – a job she will continue with the new Department of Energy and Environment, once legislation […]

The first time Mike Walsh, East Hartford’s director of finance, heard the words “performance contract,” his response was, “What’s that?” He certainly found out. “They are a pain in the butt,” he said. And he loves them. “Simply put,” Walsh said “you take money otherwise put into energy use and put it into upgrading.” But […]

Frank Calder remembers the 38-mile drive from Karl Chevrolet in New Canaan to his home in Oxford just before Christmas last year in his new electric car – a Chevrolet Volt, the first one sold in Connecticut. “Coming home on the Merritt Parkway, it was bumper-to-bumper,” Calder said. It was also cold and he knew […]

The last time Connecticut had something akin to an energy department, Jimmy Carter was president and the nation faced the aftereffects of the Arab oil embargo: crude oil had risen to $14.53 a barrel–$53.02 in today’s dollars–and the average price for a gallon of gasoline was 62 cents–$2.26 today. They would be a relief now […]

In the last decade, fuel cells–those extremely efficient electro-chemical devices that make power from hydrogen and oxygen–have been seen as Connecticut’s ticket to the alternative energy ball. The state remains a hub of the fuel cell industry, but it is a glass half full and half empty. Half full, it has created jobs and increased […]