January 10, 2020

The office of Quincy Energy Manager Shelly Dein hosted a presentation last night by Harvard Extension School graduate student Vanessa Goh of her inventory of current greenhouse gas emissions generated within city limits – along with a proposed mitigation plan. This type of report helps set a baseline for all the sources of our community’s emissions so that we can set – and hopefully meet – future targets. Continue reading →

01/16/20

Dear Governor Baker:

I urge you on behalf of the Quincy Climate Action Network to convert the MBTA buses that operate in and around our city to battery electric buses. As climate activists QCAN members are working first of all to reduce the greenhouse gas pollution that threatens the property and lives of Quincy residents, and converting the fleet to electric buses is a critical part of achieving that goal. Electric buses have one quarter the carbon footprint of diesel hybrid buses, a footprint that will grow increasingly small and eventually disappear altogether as the electricity supply comes more and more from renewable sources. Today one Quincy bus route alone, the 215, daily emits 2,000 pounds of CO2 equivalent. Continue reading →

01/27/20

Dear Editor,

In his shameless attack on a group of concerned Quincy citizens (letters, January 23), Councilor Brian Palmucci accuses Quincy Climate Action Network of making up facts in our push to amend the city’s plastic bag ban, though he conveniently neglects to identify any made-up facts we have disseminated.

We suggest that the councilor check his own facts. For example, in his letter, at the city council meeting where the ban was passed, and in emails between the councilor and QCAN members, he has repeatedly asserted that QCAN members want an outright “ban” on paper shopping bags. In fact, we are calling for a modest charge on paper bags, of a kind that’s been enacted in Boston, Cambridge, and several whole states, including California, Oregon, Vermont, and Maine, as a way to encourage the adoption of reusable shopping bags. Continue reading →

12/11/2019

Dear Editor:

The year 2019 has seen massive floods and wildfires in the US and around the globe. Glaciers and the polar ice caps continue to recede, raising sea levels ever higher. A summer heat wave in Europe caused killed thousands of people. Crops died in the fields from lack of rain or too much of it, and from increasingly unpredictable weather patterns. Plant and animal species went extinct, with the World Wildlife Fund estimating up to 100,000 extinctions per year in recent years–between 1,000 and 10,000 times the natural extinction rate. Continue reading →

September 10, 2019

Quincy Climate Action Network, Fore River Residents Against Compressor Station, and the Thomas Crane Public Library will celebrate Climate Week 2019 with a lecture by John Rogers, senior energy analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS). Rogers will speak on the promise of offshore wind power for the New England economy as well as the global environment. The lecture will take place at 7 p.m. on Tuesday September 24 at the library’s main branch, 40 Washington Street in Quincy Center. Admission is free, and all are welcome.

Continue reading →

8/29/19

Dear Editor,

The proposed ban on single-use plastic bags, which will soon come before the city council, can be a big win for the environment—if the councilors make a small but important tweak.

Single-use plastic shopping bags have a bad name, which they richly deserve. They contribute to unsightly litter; end up in the ocean, where they harm marine life; and contaminate our city’s recycling stream, leading to heavy surcharges from our recycling contractor. Quincy Climate Action Network enthusiastically supports their banning. Continue reading →

December 28, 2018

Can David still beat Goliath, even in a day when Goliath has acquired wealth and power far beyond the imaginings of the Biblical villain? That question lies at the heart of the documentary film Unfractured, which will be shown at two Quincy libraries in January. The 2017 film, cosponsored by Quincy Climate Action Network, Fore River Residents Against Compressor Station (FRRACS), and the Thomas Crane Public Library, will screen at the Adams Shore library branch, 519 Sea Street, at 7 p.m. on Monday, January 7. It will also screen at the main branch, 40 Washington Street, at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, January 16. Admission is free, and all are welcome.
Continue reading →