Stories
Summertime in New England is when people demand the most electricity from the grid because of air conditioner use. At those high-demand times, utilities turn to so-called peaker plants to supply the extra power. They’re often older, more polluting facilities, and they are expensive to run. But a project in Beverly, Massachusetts offers an alternative…
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While it was no 2018, it was another rainy day on the course at the Boston Marathon on Monday. Still, spirits were high despite the soggy weather as the race took another important step toward healing, 10 years since the marathon bombing. About 30,000 athletes from all over the world took part in the race this year.…
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Construction waste clogs landfills, worsens climate change. Two women’s solution: salvage it instead
In a humble garage on Cape Cod, Ann Jarosiewicz squeezed behind a refrigerator and bathroom vanity to thumb through a stack of doors. “I mean, that’s a beautiful antique door, right?” She and Liz Prete are founders of a building materials recycling company called “WasteNot.” And on a sunny April morning, they found themselves surrounded…
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The leader of Odanak First Nation is repeating his request for the Abenaki community’s inclusion in decision-making on Indigenous issues as Vermont’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission gets underway. The selection panel for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), made up of community members, announced the three commissioners on March 31. As outlined in Act 128, the TRC…
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It’s a chilly morning in early March. And New England Aquarium scientist Orla O’Brien and her team are preparing a small, twin propeller plane at the New Bedford Regional Airport for takeoff. It’s perfectly clear, ideal for flying and, hopefully, for spotting North Atlantic right whales from about 1,000 feet in the air. It hasn’t…
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Each year, the night before the Boston Marathon, hundreds of cyclists meet at the race’s starting line in Hopkinton for an unofficial, unsanctioned event: a midnight ride along the marathon’s 26.2 mile route. While people have been biking the Boston Marathon route for a long time, it became a more regular tradition after 2009, when a group…
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Caitlin Cleaver, the director of the Bates-Morse Mountain Conservation Area in Phippsburg, Maine, is on a dune looking out over Seawall Beach and the Sprague Marsh behind it. “This is one of the largest undeveloped barrier beaches in Maine,” she says, “and we have a conservation area behind it that is close to 600 acres.”…
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Lobstermen spend most of their professional lives on the water in a solitary pursuit, but once a year, hundreds from the North Shore to the Outer Cape gather to talk shop and to wrestle with the challenges of an uncertain future. The setting for the Massachusetts Lobstermen Association’s (MLA) annual weekend and trade show —…
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The Deer Island Wastewater Treatment Plant is a pollution success story. Over the last several decades, it transformed Boston Harbor from a nationally embarrassing cesspool into a swimmable bay. The treatment plant takes everything the people of Greater Boston send down their sinks, toilets, showers and washing machines — plus industrial waste — and treats…
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The largest remaining piece of unconserved private property in the Green Mountain National Forest has been permanently protected from development. The Rolston Rest property spans 2,744 acres along the Green Mountain ridge near Killington. It includes eight mountain summits. Hiking through, you might not even know you were on private property. The Green Mountain Club…
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