Pennsylvania Legacies

The 2021 Wild & Scenic Film Festival On Tour lands in Pennsylvania on March 18, with virtual screenings handpicked for local audiences by PEC's affiliate, the Pennsylvania Organization for Watersheds and Rivers (POWR). We chat with the makers of this year's featured selection, "A Community Conservation Effort," about Kentucky's Greenspace, Inc.

2020 was the year our relationship with trails changed forever. A look inside PEC's newly updated research on how the COVD-19 pandemic has impacted trail use across Pennsylvania, and where we go from here.

Pittsburgh's rivers made the city an industrial titan at a time when environmental damage was accepted as the price of progress. Now they're being put back to work generating low cost, carbon-free electricity -- without creating new environmental or land use impacts. Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald and Paul Jacob of Rye Development join us for a conversation on low-impact hydropower, and why the County's recently announced investment in a 17.8 MW hydro facility on the Ohio River is only the beginning.

All over the country, consumers want locally grown food. But much of the demand is concentrated in densely populated areas, where farmers have to compete with developers over a finite amount of arable land. Montgomery County has a solution: fully a third of its farmland will remain in agricultural use permanently, thanks to Montco's wildly successful Farmland Preservation Program. Administrator Stephen Zbyszinski joins us to celebrate a major milestone: 10,000 acres preserved, and counting!

Which of five finalists will be Pennsylvania's River of the Year for 2021? With less than a week remaining to vote, nominating watershed groups make their final pitch for your vote.

On its 100th anniversary, a new book explores the chain of unlikely historical events that gave us Presque Isle State Park. Authors David Frew and Jerry Skrypzak discuss the book, the Isle, and their hometown of Erie, PA.

Winners of the 2020 Northeast Environmental Partnership Awards and 2020 Western Pennsylvania Environmental Awards, in their own words.

After decades of struggle, Pittsburgh's Hazelwood neighborhood is poised for an economic comeback. The long-awaited redevelopment of Hazelwood's industrial riverfront has rekindled hopes for a brighter future -- but the neighborhood's resident historian says there's also much to celebrate about, and learn from, its past. Our series on the Hazelwood Green project continues in conversation with JaQuay Carter of the Greater Hazelwood Historical Society.

Celebrating ten years of the PEC Environment Ride in conversation with members of the 2020 team.

For the better part of a century, the Hazelwood neighborhood was one of Pittsburgh's most important industrial centers. That all changed with the 1997 closure of the LTV steel plant on the site now known as Hazelwood Green. Now, as a decades-long redevelopment effort gathers momentum, the neighborhood is reimagining its relationship with the Monongahela River. We discuss the future of Hazelwood's riverfront with Todd Stern of U3 Advisors, which is overseeing the project on behalf of property owner Almono LP. Along with PEC and others, U3 is working with residents and stakeholders to develop a community-focused vision for the site.

A reckoning over RGGI, outdoor recreation and COVID, bipartisan love for community solar, and clearing a path for E-bikes: Legal & Government Affairs VP John Walliser reviews the PEC policy agenda heading into what promises to be an eventful fall in Harrisburg.

The 2020 PEC Public Lands Ride showcases some of the best trail-riding in the state, and this year's ride features an expanded lineup of routes in state parks and forests. Organizers Helena Kotala and Frank Maguire explain how they overhauled the original concept to create a safe and enjoyable experience for cyclists of all kinds.

Like humans, animals need space and the ability to move safely across it. But habitat fragmentation caused by development is disrupting wildlife migration, leading to more frequent and sometimes dangerous encounters with people -- and the effects will only intensify with climate change. We discuss with supporters of a resolution, currently before the General Assembly, that calls for action to protect and support wildlife corridors in Pennsylvania.

Fixing leaks in the natural gas supply chain is critical to reducing Pennsylvania's greenhouse gas emissions, and proposed new requirements for gas facilities would hold operators accountable for detecting and repairing them. With estimated emissions from gas operations exceeding a million tons a year in Pennsylvania alone, that's a big job -- even though the draft rule, as currently written, exempts broad swaths of facilities that other states treat as potential emitters. Fortunately, there's a whole industry dedicated to efficiently detecting gas leaks using cutting-edge technology -- and as these tools get more sophisticated, methane mitigation becomes more cost-effective by the day. But will the finished rule take full advantage of these resources and hold all producers to the same standard?

The GAP Relay -- a 150-mile race along the Great Allegheny Passage -- is back for its third year, despite a global crisis that forced organizers to completely rethink the event. One thing hasn't changed: the sustainability partnership between PEC and event host P3R that made the GAP Relay the greenest relay race in America. We welcome back P3R's Troy Schooley to discuss the new format and the growing movement for sustainability in distance running. Then, a closer look at one of the tools PEC used to mitigate the GAP Relay's environmental impact: carbon offsets obtained via the Bonneville Environmental Foundation (BEF) in Portland, Oregon. BEF's Heather Schrock explains how offsets work -- and how individuals and businesses of all sizes can use them to pursue their own sustainability goals.

"Every day is like a weekend day now," read one response to PEC's recent survey of Pennsylvania trail managers about outdoor recreation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Dozens of respondents reported -- and counter data confirmed -- that statewide trail use had surged amid school cancellations, business closures, and stay-at-home orders during March and April. What can the data tell us about the role trails and greenways play in the lives of Pennsylvanians, especially during a crisis? Amy Camp, who helped compile the report published earlier this month, is our guest.

As the Department of Environmental Protection gathers public comment on a proposed rulemaking to cut emissions of climate-changing methane from Pennsylvania's natural gas industry, new data from the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) paints a stark picture of what's at stake: current emissions up to fifteen times higher than official estimates, and projected emissions of up to 14 million tons a year by 2030. EDF researcher Hillary Hull explains.

These days, environmental issues are politically charged in a way that can make sound, commonsense policy seem unattainable. But it wasn't always like that -- and it doesn't have to be. Tom Ridge, the Republican former governor of Pennsylvania, says he's an environmentalist because of -- not in spite of -- his conservative values.

Any way you slice it, coal-fired power generation is on its way out. That leaves two likely scenarios for Pennsylvania's electricity sector in the next decade: a modest reduction in greenhouse gas emissions with little economic impact, or a dramatic reduction coupled with massive investment in energy innovation and efficiency. Department of Environmental Protection energy advisor Hayley Book breaks down the costs and benefits of membership in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) as detailed in DEP's latest statistical modeling.

At 96, Thomas Dolan is part of a very exclusive club: surviving founders of the Pennsylvania Environmental Council. As we mark the 50th Earth Day this week, we continue our celebration of PEC's own semi-centennial with reflections from someone who was there when it all began.