Wind turbines off Blyth, UK (Flickr’s Zabdiel

The coalition sent a letter to President Obama today with more than 200 signers, including the National Wildlife Federation, Environment America, Physicians for Social Responsibility, and dozens of other groups representing millions of Americans. It calls for continued federal leadership to move away from fossil fuels and applauds administration efforts over the last year, specifically the Interior Department’s “Smart from the Start” initiative. The program has designated appropriate areas for wind development in federal waters off the coast of six Atlantic states—Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware and Virginia.

What is the coalition specifically asking the Obama administration to do?

• Support federal financial investments to spur offshore wind development;
• Set a bold goal for offshore wind in the Atlantic;
• Ensure that offshore wind projects are sited, constructed and operated responsibly;
• Provide DOI and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management with sufficient staff and resources, and
• Prioritize coordination to secure a market for offshore wind power.

Some people have a misperception that you have to choose between offshore wind energy and thriving wildlife populations. Much of that is due to a misinformation campaign funded in large part by William Koch, one of the billionaire polluting Koch brothers who’s fighting clean energy just because he doesn’t want to see it off his Cape Cod estate. The truth is that America urgently needs to clean up our electricity grid if we are to protect wildlife from the dangers of climate change. Experiences in Europe show us that offshore wind energy can be ramped up rapidly, economically, and an in a way that protects our wildlife and natural resources.

The federal government is making wildlife protection a top priority as it moves forward with offshore wind energy siting, leasing and development. From today’s Washington Post report on the planned auction to Atlantic Ocean offshore wind farm developers:

Before opening offshore plots to wind farms — the total area is more than 1.5 million acres — the government is spending millions to study the distribution and behavior of such federally protected migratory species as red knots, roseate terns and piping plovers, as well as of diving birds, which forage on the continental shelf.

“Conservationists of all political stripes are united behind offshore wind as a winner for America’s wildlife, public health and economy,” says Catherine Bowes, the National Wildlife Federation’s senior manager for new energy solutions. “Clean energy solutions are critical to protecting our wildlife, fish and natural resources for future generations of outdoor enthusiasts.”

Take Action

Tell the Obama administration you support properly sited and developed offshore wind energy to protect wildlife. Please take a moment to email the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management urging them to bring clean wind energy to states along the Atlantic coast.

Girl Power with the Construction of the Freedom Tower in the Backdrop.

On Saturday, June 23, 2012, thousands of amazing Girl Scouts converged at Liberty State Park for New Jersey Girl Scouts Council’s “BIG Celebration” (“Believe In Girls”).

National Wildlife Federation was the Eco-Service Project Partner for this special event, meaning we organized the service project to convert a grass field into wildlife habitat.

Everyone was in great spirits, lots of families and troops working together and the Girl Scouts got a service patch to recognize their contribution. For a great Star Ledger article about the event, click here.

Over the course of the day we transformed a 1,500 square-foot lawn into habitat for wildlife!

Here were the necessary ingredients to make the event so successful:

• 650 plants planted (600 were natives from American Beauties and 50 annuals)
• 600 cubic yards of mulch spread
• 1,500 gallons of water for plants
• 2,200 scouts and leaders
• 15 NWF Certified Wildlife Habitat owners
• 42 Verizon Employees (volunteers)
• 15 Liberty Mutual Employees (volunteers)
• 7 Liberty State Park employees
• 10 Girl Scout Employees of Northern New Jersey Council (volunteers)

Planting Trees in the Shadow of Lady Liberty

Girl Power + Shovels = New Wildlife Habitat

Digging holes, planting, watering and mulching almost what feels like right under the rising Freedom Tower and the Statute of Liberty made me proud to be American, a former New Jersey guy and NWFer. The Girl Scouts and our great partners made this special park even better.

Verizon employees also made the day special with an amazing turnout and energy. We had 42 Verizon volunteers participate in the event. It was exciting to see Verizon volunteers bring out their family to the event. All the volunteers made a real contribution to all the hard work it takes to get 650 plants in the ground.

Team Verizon Makes a Difference

Barry Sullivan and Marie Longo, both certified habitat owners for over 12 years, each gave two days of service (and took time off work) to  share their passion for wildlife and talk about their own habitats and the work NWF does with Girl Scouts and volunteers alike.

A special thanks goes out to all the volunteers, as well as my fellow NWF coworkers, who are doing a great job of getting kids outside and connected to nature.

Related Links:

• Garden for Wildlife – Learn how you can create wildlife-friendly habitat by providing food, water, cover and a place for wildlife to raise young.
• Certify your Wildlife Garden – Get your home, school, business or community designated as a Certified Wildlife Habitat.
• Volunteer with NWF – Find out how you can volunteer with NWF to help others learn about making wildlife habitat.
• Plant Trees for Wildlife – Learn how you can host a tree-planting event with your scout troop or community group.
• NWF’s Eco-Schools USA Program – See how NWF is helping inspire kids of all ages to help create sustainable schools and care for the environment.

Please consider becoming an NWF member to support these and other important activities >>

An Atlantic harbor seal surfaced just once, but it was long enough for Brett Klaproth to snap a picture from the marina at Cheesequake Creek Inlet in Morgan, New Jersey.

This Photo of the Day was donated by a participant in the annual National Wildlife Photo Contest. See more photos or sign up for the 42nd Annual National Wildlife Photo Contest.

Laura Hickey, Ben Franklin students, US EPA's Director Jane Nishida and Justin Harris (Photo by Justin Harris, US EPA)

But this wasn’t just any trip.

Director Nishida and Justin Harris will be part of an EPA delegation that is visiting Taiwan next week, and our New Jersey trip was scheduled so that she would have a better understanding of what Sustainable Jersey and NWF’s Eco-Schools USA program are trying to accomplish by working with Taiwan: helping them to develop a ‘sustainable communities and schools program’ based on our US programs.

The highlight of the trip for me was the visit to Ben Franklin Elementary School.  Ben Franklin is one of our registered Eco-Schools and is a Silver Award school in our program.  Their motto is: “If I work hard enough, I will succeed.”  Ben Franklin is a Pre-K-3 school, and the students are incredibly engaging.  They also have a ‘sister school’ relationship with Jian-An Elementary in New Taipei City, Taiwan, and their principal, Mr. Christopher Turnbull, has been on a former EPA delegation to Taiwan to visit with his sister school counterparts.  Even Amos the Mouse – the school’s mascot – has been to Taiwan!

Ben Franklin received its Eco-Schools USA Silver Award for addressing the program’s seven steps and three Pathways:  Energy, Water, and Consumption and Waste.  Each class has what they call EPA representatives, and they rotate this responsibility among students over the school year.

Ben Franklin Principal Chris Turnbull, Randy Solomon (SJ), Jane Nishida (US EPA), Laura Hickey (NWF) (Photo by Justin Harris, US EPA)

The best part of my job is being able to visit our Eco-Schools and see what wonderful things that they are accomplishing on the path to sustainability.  Principal Turnbull assures me that Ben Franklin will be applying for the coveted Green Flag award in the near future!  I look forward to being there when they receive that prestigious honor!

I was very fortunate to be offered the opportunity to travel on a US EPA mission to Taiwan this week with our partners from Sustainable Jersey, Donna Drewes and Randy Solomon, and Justin Harris from the US EPA International and Tribal Affairs division.  The purpose of the trip was to meet with Taiwanese governmental and private sector personnel to discuss what a sustainable community and sustainable schools program might look like and how it could be implemented.

We met several times with so many incredible people in the Taiwanese Environmental Protection Administration (called EPAT) as well as those in the sustainable development and environmental education communities there. Minister Stephen Shu-hung Shen (the counterpart to Lisa Jackson, our US EPA Administrator) was generous with his time and very dedicated to ensuring that we are able to forge a partnership between the US and Taiwan on sustainable communities and schools through establishing “sister” communities in New Jersey and in key Taiwan cities such as Taipei and New Taipei City.  Minister Shen said on multiple occasions, that he “looks forward to our continuing support, and during the Year of the Dragon, hope to have more partners join us in making our Mother Earth cleaner and more sustainable.”

It’s true what they say that it is, indeed, a small world, with multiple connections through common colleagues in the environmental education community and a shared desire to advance environmental literacy – not only in students, but in the broader community as well.

The work that Taiwan is doing on Low Carbon Communities (big PDF) is truly striking and an example that I wish could be replicated here in the United States.  A good starting point is the amazing work that Sustainable Jersey is doing through a program that they’ve developed on municipality certification that focuses on ways that municipalities work collaboratively in a public, private partnership to go green, save money, and take steps to sustain their quality of life over the long term.

In Taiwan (L-R: Donna Drewes, Randy Solomon, Laura Hickey, Minister Shen, Justin Harris)

I’m excited about the unlimited possibilities that these strategic partnerships with Sustainable Jersey, Taiwan and  the US EPA afford us as we broaden our “Global Dimensions” and make those connections with schools, communities NGOs, and governments country to country and city to city, especially in how we work together to “make our Mother Earth cleaner and more sustainable.”

Over the course of six years, these wildlife rock stars–and yes, volunteers–got more than 180 Montclair homes (30 over just the last year), 10 schools, five community gardens or parks, five businesses, three churches and two synagogues to become Certified Wildlife Habitat^® sites.

Sabina Ernst tells the Montclair story better than anyone:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Sabina: “I live in Montclair, New Jersey, and I have been part of the habitat team here since pretty much the beginning. I heard about Dave Wasmuth through a friend and started to get interested in native plants. It was something that really interested me because it seems very sustainable and the right model to follow….The whole town is represented not just one cluster…. It is a good thing to do.  It has been really fun. It feels like we have done a really good thing for Montclair and for the Earth.”

Certified Habitats bring welcomed visitors (photo taken in front of Sabrina's front yard)

The Montclair volunteers also made this great website to spread the good news, and organize the community effort.

New Jersey’s First Community Wildlife Habitat

With the community pulling together for wildlife like never before, Montclair has become New Jersey’s first certified Community Wildlife Habitat and the 38th certified community in the nation.

This means that residents, businesses, places of worship and others are providing the basics for desired wildlife – food, water, cover, and places to raise young – while helping the environment by using native plants, composting, eliminating pesticide use, and conserving water.

Dave and Jose Proud Gardeners and Community Leaders

Backyard Habitat Tour

On July 11, I took advantage of their annual “Backyard Habitat Tour,” where Montclair residents opened up their backyards for visitors to see the amazing things they have done to bring nature to their backyards. These National Wildlife Federation volunteers are working every day to improve their community and help wildlife.

It was great meeting Dave Wasmuth who has led the charge in Montclair. His gardens were a great mix of flowers, native plants and vegetables.

I also got to meet Jose German who, along with Dave, made their home a special place. Jose was really inspirational to me. He left his job as an accountant to form www.greenharmonynow.com, a landscaping business that helps businesses and homeowners choose wildlife friendly landscaping.

Dave and Jose also showed me how Montclair planted some trees along their road. Many of the trees died but the one planted in Dave and Jose’s yard is thriving. I think they are on to something!

Wildlife Habitat Makes Homes and Communities a Special Place

Sabina has lead the charge to not only make her yard wildlife-friendly but also she has worked with her local schools where her children attend school to certify them in NWF’s Schoolyard Habitat program. She also told me that she has seen a Cooper Hawk in her backyard, along with the cute rabbit that I saw.

Spreading the Love for Wildlife

Dave, Jose, Sabina and others are not just thinking about Montclair. They are reaching out to other neighboring towns as well.

Anne Stires is from down the road in Verona, and she is so excited by this project that she joined the Montclair Habitat Team and helped out the Montclair volunteers with their event. Anne is also the President of the Hilltop Conservancy in Verona, which is responsible for protecting and restoring one of the last large tracks of undeveloped land in this area.

All this inspiration makes me see how Dave, Jose and Sabina’s efforts can be multiplied by others across New Jersey.

We could create a large “corridor” of backyard, school, and community habitats across New Jersey. Of course, we need to protect our critical landscapes like the New Jersey Highlands, but it all starts in the home or in this case in the backyard.

Learn more about how to turn your garden or yard into a National Wildlife Federation Certified Wildlife Habitat^® site

Despite the nasty heatwave ripping through the northeast that day, the un-airconditioned room of the Walt Whitman Arts Center was filled with interested community members – mainly Hispanics. After a few introductory remarks from myself, the National Vice President of Democracia USA, Rafael Collazo, shared some great opening remarks (video below).

“It’s critically important that all of us as leaders take this message [about how we care about our community and environment] to the rest of our community and let them know that we can make a difference.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

Melissa Castro, Director of Outreach for Souther NJ for U.S. Senator Menendez, spoke on behalf of the Senator and had some inspiring things to say as well:

“Too many children and families live with the nightmare of severe asthma triggered by pollution. The health problems that these children suffer remind us of the dangers of air pollution for ALL Americans…When it comes to protecting the lives and health of our citizens there is no room for compromise.”

The event didn’t just focus on the national Clean Air Act issues though – there were a lot of related topics that were addressed by the other panelists who ranged from local elected officials to Environmental Justice leaders and lawyers. Some of these topics included:

• Clean water and fish contaminants in the Delaware River Watershed
• Air pollution, soil contamination, and creating organic urban gardens
• State and regional initiatives to cut back global warming pollution

In the end though, what I found most inspiring was the amount of enthusiasm and energy from the participants after the panelists spoke. They were coming up with questions about how to better engage young kids in schools, what they could do to be more involved, how they could help out in some lawsuits to help cleanup local Superfund sites, etc. It was powerful stuff. I suppose I haven’t gone to enough townhalls to realize that these events can be quite powerful – you don’t typically go to townhalls JUST to listen. You go there to be inspired and find ways you can help. One woman at the event put all of this into perspective:

“I’m here tonight because I’m American…We are ALL in the same boat – and that boat has a hole in it.”

It’s my dream that each of us can find a way to do our part to fill that hole and inspire others to do the same.

Stuart Fox at PopSci.com reports:

“With the US granting wind power plant leases off the coasts of New Jersey and Delaware, the UK planning to overtake nuclear power with wind in five years, and even coal loving China getting in on the act, all the talk about wind power these days has focused on offshore wind farms. However, a new study suggests that the wind power mother lode may be up in the sky, not off in the sea. Sure, high altitude wind power isn’t the newest idea in the world. Not only has the tech been around for a couple of years, but companies like Kite Gen and Sky WindPower are already trying to break into the market. However, this study is the first to identify the best spots to place the high-flying turbines.”

See full article. >>