Celebrating Energy Independence Day? Join a "Crowd-Sourced" Documentary on March 21

Working on making Vermont energy independent? Want to be in a movie?

Bright Blue EcoMedia, the local company behind the lake pollution documentary Bloom, is planning a new “crowd-sourced” documentary to consist of footage gathered all over the state on March 21, which activists have dubbed “Vermont Energy Independence Day.” That’s the day Vermont Yankee’s license expires.

Jon Erickson of the University of Vermont's Gund Institute for Ecological Economics says Bright Blue is partnering with 350.org and other eco-groups to get the word out that “anyone with a camera and an image to share of Vermont’s energy transition” can contribute by uploading their video to a special YouTube channel. (More info here.)

Fracking Aside, Vermont Eyes Natural Gas Expansion

As reported in today’s issue of Seven Days, a possible moratorium on hydraulic fracturing is wending its way through the Statehouse. In a preemptive strike, lawmakers are considering putting the brakes on the controversial method of drilling for natural gas more commonly known as fracking.

But despite the state’s apparent squeamishness over fracking, Vermont is moving ahead with plans to expand its natural gas network.

Right now, Vermont gets about 6 percent of its energy from natural gas. There's only one gas utility in the state: Vermont Gas Systems, a subsidiary of Montreal-based Gaz Métro, which since 1965 has piped natural gas from the Canadian border to customers in Chittenden and Franklin counties.

Now Vermont Gas Systems is looking to expand. The utility won approval last fall from the Vermont Public Service Board to funnel $4.4 million annually into an expansion fund, with an eye toward extending its reach into Addison and Rutland counties as early as 2015.

Natural gas “doesn’t do sprawl well,” says Steve Wark, Vermont Gas director of communications. That means the utility is looking for places with a population density to support new pipelines. And that population — especially when it comes to local business — is hungry for natural gas. Cheaper fuel means bigger profits.

“Right now our focus is on helping businesses and residential consumers save money by using natural gas,” Wark says.

Statehouse Reacts to Vermont Yankee Ruling

Bob Stannard was standing in the Statehouse cafeteria Thursday when his phone rang. It was Gov. Peter Shumlin, calling to tell him that a federal judge had finally ruled on Vermont Yankee's lawsuit against the state. Entergy, owner of the nuclear power plant Stannard had lobbied to shut down for five years, had won. The state had lost.

"I haven't had a chance to read this tome," said Stannard (pictured), glancing over the 102-page decision on his iPhone. "It appears we'll get nothing from Entergy except radiation and spent fuel. We get stuck with their waste."

News spread quicky through the capitol Thursday afternoon after federal Judge J. Garvan Murtha ruled that the 40-year-old nuclear reactor can remain open past 2012, and that the Vermont Legislature pre-empted federal authority when it voted to shut the plant down two years ago. Stannard fought to close the plant for five years as the lobbyist for the Vermont Citizens Action Network. He witnessed a major milestone in 2010 when the Vermont Senate, led by then-Senate President Peter Shumlin, voted 26 to 4 against letting state regulators hear the plant's petition for a 20-year license extension.

At the time, a series of radioactive leaks and false statements by company officials had Entergy on the run. But Entergy sued the state, contending that federal agencies, not states, had sole authority to regulate nuclear power. When Thursday's ruling arrived in favor of Vermont Yankee, Stannard and other Statehouse denizens seemed disappointed, but hardly surprised.

Lowell Wind Opponents Decry USDA Forest Service Approval of Deerfield Wind Project

Just three days into 2012, Vermont's critics of industrial wind power already have a new ridgeline in the sand to fight about: The USDA Forest Service just granted final approval to Iberdrola, Inc. to build more than a dozen, 393-foot wind turbines on two ridgelines in the Green Mountain National Forest in southern Vermont.

The project, known as Deerfield Wind, located near the towns of Readsboro and Searsburg, gained federal approval for 15 of the 17 turbines that were OK'ed two years ago by the Vermont Public Service Board. The PSB approval came despite objections from the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources and others that the project would damage critical bear habitat. The new ridgeline development will be located not far from the existing Searsburg Wind Power Facility, Vermont's first industrial wind project, which went online in July 1997.

According to Iberdrola, Deerfield Wind is expected to generate enough power to light 14,000 Vermont homes, or roughly three-quarters of the households in Windham County. In September 2010, Central Vermont Public Service announced a long-term, fixed-rate power purchase agreement with Iberdrola Renewables to buy 20 of the 30 megawatts generated by the Deerfield project for its Vermont customers. According to the Iberdrola website, it's now looking to secure other Vermont-based purchasers of the Deerfield electricity so all the power is consumed locally.

Sanders and Sandia Announce New $15 Million Energy Lab at University of Vermont

By the summer of 2013, Vermont will be the first state in the nation to have near-universal electrical smart-grid coverage — and Sandia National Laboratories is setting up shop at the University of Vermont to make it all happen.

That was Sen. Bernie Sanders' announcement at a press conference in his Burlington office this morning. Gov. Peter Shumlin, Green Mountain Power CEO Mary Powell, UVM President John Bramley and Sandia Vice President Rick Stulen joined Sanders to announce a three-year, $15 million commitment to open the first-ever national laboratory in New England in Burlington. 

The new lab, dubbed the Center for Energy Transformation and Innovation (CETI), will make as the centerpiece of its work the rollout of smart meters throughout the Green Mountain State, enabling all the state's utilities to better manage energy consumption and better integrate renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind, into the power grid. The $15 million commitment comes in addition to the $69 million already allocated to Vermont from the federal government to roll out smart meters statewide.

VIDEO: Arrest of Six Lowell Mountain Protesters and Barton Chronicle Publisher

The Arrests from Hunter on Vimeo.

Vermonters for a Clean Environment released new video last night of the Dec. 5 arrest of six protesters, as well as journalist Chris Braithwaite of the Barton Chronicle, who was covering the recent standoff on Lowell Mountain. The video shows the orderly and nonviolent arrest of six activists (including the videographer) who stood in the middle of the Lowell Mountain clearcut wearing shirts that read, "Ridges aren't renewable" and "Once it's destroyed, it can't be put back." As construction vehicles roll by, an Orleans County Sheriff's deputy, backed up by a Vermont State Police trooper, explains to the activists how they'll be detained and transported off the mountain.

Unfortunately, the activist's video camera couldn't capture the audio of Braithwaite's confrontation with Orleans County deputy Phil Brooks. But the 67-year-old founder, co-owner and publisher of the Chronicle spoke to Seven Days shortly after his release on Monday to explain what transpired.

"I did what I've always done up there, which is cover any protests and gone wherever the protesters go," Braithwaite says. "So, in this case, they were in the middle of the crane path, and so was I." 

Occupiers and Environmentalists Confront Vermont Democrats (VIDEO)

Yesterday was a rough day to be a Vermont Democrat.

First, labor activists got pissed off when party chairman Jake Perkinson quashed an effort to have a pro-state-worker resolution taken up at the party's annual organizational meeting. The resolution was prompted by some Democrats concerned that Gov. Peter Shumlin was interfering with state workers' collective-bargaining rights by filing a grievance over being denied emergency pay in the wake of Tropical Storm Irene.

Then, a few hours later, a group of about 50 people confronted the governor, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and other Democratic bigwigs as they entered the Socialist Labor Party Hall in Barre for the fall fundraising dinner.  

The group of protesters had a mixed bag of concerns, but all revolved around the state's energy policies: the industrialization of Vermont's ridge lines, specifically the Shumlin administration's precedent of turning the Lowell Mountain ridge lines into an industrial wind farm, and what that may bode for other mountain vistas in Vermont; and the corporatization of the state's utilities. They voiced objections to the state's  increasingly cozy relationship with Green Mountain Power.

Albany Woman Launches Hunger Strike to Protest Lowell Mountain Wind Project

UPDATED BELOW

A 71-year-old Albany woman has entered the second week of a hunger strike launched to protest what she calls the permanent destruction of the Lowell Mountain range in the name of industrial wind development.

Carol Irons, a retired mental health case worker whose home faces Lowell Mountain, began her hunger strike on October 13 and is consuming only water and juice. She says she's prepared to continue her fast "for as long as it takes" to stop the project. She insists her concerns have far less to do with the visual impact of the 21-turbine wind project than the effects on wildlife, public health and the environment. As someone with Abenaki heritage, Irons says it's crucial that Vermonters adhere to the Native American principle that all our decisions first consider the impact on seven generations of our descendants. 

Occupy Lowell Mountain Launches Blog From The Blasting Zone

Talk about your daily blasts: Protesters making a last-ditch effort to halt construction of Green Mountain Power's Kingdom Community Wind Project on Lowell Mountain have launched a daily blog, called "Mountain Talk,"  to spread the word about their ongoing "tent-in" and invite newcomers to join them.

As reported in my story this week, "Occupy Lowell Mountain? Despite Court Order, Opponents Camp Near GMP Blasting Zone," opponents of the 21-turbine, $163 million wind project in the Northeast Kingdom have set up a round-the-clock encampment on land owned by the project's most vocal critics, Don and Shirley Nelson. The protesters, who have permission from the Nelsons, are set up within GMP’s blasting zone and say they’re prepared to stay on the mountain all winter, if necessary, in order to prevent the project from moving forward.

Last week, GMP offered to buy the Nelsons' property at their initial asking price of $1.25 million — the land has been for sale for about a decade — but also threatened the couple with a $1 million lawsuit if the campers don't leave the blast zone and delay construction. The Nelsons said no, then upped their asking price to $2.25 million.

Says Don Nelson, 69, "If they’re gonna sue me for $1 million, I’m gonna add a million to the price tag. It's high-stakes poker, and I don’t intend to sell out to the enemy if I can help it."

Obama Administration Promises to Expedite Permits for Vermont Wind Project

The Obama Administration announced today that a 15-turbine wind farm proposed for the Green Mountain National Forest in southern Vermont will receive expedited federal permitting and environmental reviews.

Deerfield Wind, a project to be built in Searsburg and Readsboro with a portion of it in the federal Green Mountain National Forest, will see its federal review conducted by year's end, speeding up the review process by as much as six months.

The wind farm is one of 14 so-called infrastructure projects that the Obama administration will give special treatment. The project's developer, Spain-based Iberdrola Renewables, has received top treatment by the Obama White House before. In 2010, it was revealed that the firm received nearly $1 billion in federal stimulus funds even though many of its projects were already underway.

"We are pleased the administration has recognized the significance that infrastructure investments, such as wind projects, can play in promoting economic development and that they intend to help expedite permitting for our proposed project on forest service land," said Paul Copleman, an Iberdrola spokesman.

The federal government is currently reviewing Deerfield, and an intitial decision from the district forester is expected next week. Appeals were initially scheduled to run at least 90 days before any review is passed up the federal food chain for a final decision. Today's news could compress that schedule dramatically.