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Posted inEnergy & Environment, Money

Former CT DEP chief takes fire for the EPA

Former Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection (when it was still called that) chief Gina McCarthy has gotten herself onto a hot seat for the Environmental Protection Agency where she’s hung her hat during the Obama administration as the EPA’s assistant administrator of the Office of Air and Radiation. Politico reports that McCarthy had to answer […]

Posted inEnergy & Environment

State renews permit for Bridgeport Harbor Station Coal Plant

After receiving a record number of comments from the public, the state has renewed the operating permit for Connecticut’s lone coal-fired power plant in Bridgeport. Environmental advocates from groups such as the Sierra Club, the Connecticut Fund for the Environment, and the Bridgeport-based Healthy Connecticut Alliance had worked for months to bring more than 150 […]

Posted inEnergy & Environment, Money

Malloy noncommittal on resetting RGGI

The pressure is ticking up on Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and nine other Northeast and Mid-Atlantic governors participating in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative — the nation’s first carbon dioxide trading and reduction program. Letters went out Thursday to all 10 RGGI (pronounced reggie) state governors asking them to support adjusting the program to make […]

Posted inEnergy & Environment, Money

A new tool for state’s energy reduction drive

A second critical piece of the process to help agencies reduce energy use 10 percent by January, as mandated in the 2011 energy law, is moving into place. The Department of Energy and Environmental Protection today unveils its performance contract program — also required in that law. Performance contracts finance energy efficiency projects with the […]

Posted inEnergy & Environment, Money

Malloy names Caron to utilities regulatory authority

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy appointed former state Rep. Michael Caron, a Republican, on Thursday to serve as a director of the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority, a three-member panel responsible for regulating rates and services of electricity, natural gas, water, and telecommunications providers. Caron represented Killingly and Plainfield in the House of Representatives from 1991 through […]

Posted inEnergy & Environment

One-third of Environment Committee gets failing grade

Nine of 28 members of the legislature’s Environment Committee got failing grades in an environmental scorecard issued today by the Connecticut League of Conservation Voters, and Democrats outscored Republicans by a widening margin. Overall, the legislature got improving grades from 2011 to 2012, when the average score jumped from 76 percent to 91 percent. A […]

Posted inEnergy & Environment, Money

State’s energy strategy likely to increase fees

There was a nugget of news in the big energy speech Gov. Dannel P. Malloy gave at the Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships’ annual summit Thursday, which happened to be in his hometown of Stamford. Turns out the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection also Thursday released its long-term energy strategy known as the Integrated Resource […]

Posted inEnergy & Environment, Money

GMO labeling: technically alive, but realistically dead

The prospect of Connecticut passing groundbreaking first-of-its-kind legislation to label genetically modified food is basically nonexistent. Late last week lawyers from the Legislative Commissioners’ Office forced sponsors to gut the bill so that even if it passes — still a long shot — it would be little more than a statement of concern about GMOs, […]