June 30, 2020 — A recent spike in U.S. COVID-19 cases has put the domestic foodservice sector back on the defensive.
Some U.S. restaurants are voluntarily re-closing their dining rooms – and many states and cities are now requiring masks in all public places – as cases jumped nationwide in the past week.
June 17, 2020 — New Jersey wants to be known for more than just its shores and casinos.
June 17, 2020 — New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy says the state will develop a dedicated offshore wind energy port on the lower Delaware River, spending up to $400 million to support the state’s ambitious goal of developing 7,500 megawatts of wind power capacity by 2035.
Located adjacent to the Hope Creek nuclear power station in Lower Alloways Creek Township in rural Salem County, the site of 200-plus acres is close to the deep-draft ship channel from Philadelphia to Delaware Bay and the Atlantic – and downstream from highway bridges over the river. That eliminates the constraints of air draft at other East Coast ports like New York, where even bridge clearances of 200 feet will not be enough to accommodate the size of next-generation turbine components carried on barges and installation vessels.
“Offshore wind is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to not only protect our environment but also greatly expand our state economy in a way that has immediate impacts and paves the way for long-term growth,” Murphy said Tuesday in announcing the site selection. “The New Jersey Wind Port will create thousands of high-quality jobs, bring millions of investment dollars to our state, and establish New Jersey as the national capital of offshore wind.”
Murphy’s announcement came at a pivotal moment for U.S. offshore wind, days after the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management released a supplemental draft environmental impact statement that looks at cumulative impacts of more than a dozen proposed turbine arrays off the East Coast.
May 11, 2020 — New Jersey’s hard-hit fishing industry will be allocated $11 million of the $300 million available in the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, or CARES Act, according to U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone Jr.
Pallone, a Democrat whose Sixth District stretches along the coast of much of Monmouth and Middlesex counties, said the money will be made available to the commercial fishing, charter and for-hire fishing businesses, aquaculture operations, processors and other fishery-related businesses in the state. The money will be in the form of grants that do not have to be repaid.
The CARES Act was approved by Congress on March 27. Pallone said he thought it “outrageous” that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has taken until May to make the funds available. Even still, the funds are not ready to be distributed.
May 1, 2020 — The $2.2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act passed by Congress and signed by the president on March 25 set aside $300 million in COVID-19 relief funding to help the nation’s fishing community. Members of the recreational and commercial fishing industry can qualify for funding if they’ve lost 35% of their revenue compared to a previous 5-year average.
Yet more than month since the cash was made available, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy and all 14 New Jersey members of Congress, are still waiting to see how and when these funds are to be dispersed in the areas hardest hit by the global pandemic.
On April 23, the New Jersey congressional delegation sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Commerce (Commerce) and the federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) concerning the $300 million in fisheries assistance made available through the CARES Act. The letter addressed to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and OMB Acting Director Russell T. Vought seeks a transparent distribution methodology that accounts for the economic devastation wrought by the COVID19 pandemic in the hardest hit states like New Jersey, and the execution of the disbursed funds as soon as possible.
April 23, 2020 — Gov. Phil Murphy’s Wind Council today released a report detailing plans for creating the Wind Innovation and New Development (WIND) Institute. The WIND Institute will serve as a center for education, research, innovation, and workforce training related to the development of offshore wind in New Jersey and the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region.
In August 2019, Governor Murphy signed Executive Order No. 79, establishing a Council for the Wind Innovation and New Development Institute, charged with developing and implementing a plan to create a regional hub for New Jersey’s burgeoning offshore wind industry and build upon the Murphy Administration’s commitment to making New Jersey a national leader in offshore wind. The Council includes representatives from the Office of the Secretary of Higher Education, the New Jersey Economic Development Authority, the Board of Public Utilities, the Department of Education, the Department of Environmental Protection, and the Department of Labor and Workforce Development.
“Offshore wind is coming to the United States and bringing billions of investment dollars and thousands of jobs along with it,” said Governor Murphy. “This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to not only grow New Jersey’s economy, but also move rapidly toward a clean energy future that puts us on a path to 100 percent clean energy by 2050. The report released today outlines our plans for establishing a WIND Institute that will facilitate workforce development, research, and innovation in New Jersey’s offshore wind industry, ensuring that we take full advantage of this opportunity to grow our economy and create new opportunities for New Jersey workers while protecting our environment.”
To inform its recommendations, the Wind Council assessed the state of the offshore wind industry in New Jersey, conducted a gap analysis of workforce assets in the state, and facilitated discussions with a range of stakeholder groups, including offshore wind industry members, organized labor, four-year colleges and universities, community colleges, vocational technical schools and comprehensive high schools, and fisheries.
January 28, 2020 — New Jersey will become the first state in the nation to require builders to consider the impact of climate change if they want their projects approved, Gov. Phil Murphy announced Monday as he unveiled the final version of the state’s new energy master plan.
The Democratic governor outlined the plan in a speech at Stockton University in Galloway, calling the 290-page document “ground zero” for “weaning the state off its century-old addiction to fossil fuels.”
The document lays out the Murphy administration’s vision for how to ensure the state reaches its lofty green energy goals: 50% clean energy by 2030, and 100% clean energy by 2050.
The plan is intended to slash the Garden State’s greenhouse gas emissions, reducing New Jersey’s contribution to climate change.
Murphy warned Monday that climate change is direct threat to New Jersey. He citied a recent Rutgers University report that said sea levels along New Jersey’s coast are expected to rise more than one foot by 2030 and two feet by 2050.
January 22, 2020 — Gov. Phil Murphy signed into law on Tuesday a bill to expand the definition of a qualified offshore wind project, which amends an existing law that is commonly referred to as the “Offshore Wind Economic Development Act.”
The measure requires developers seeking New Jersey Board of Public Utilities approval as a qualified offshore wind project to include within its detailed description for the project any transmission facilities and interconnection facilities to be installed.
The bill allows the NJBPU to conduct one or more competitive solicitations for open access offshore wind transmission facilities designed to expedite the collection or delivery of offshore wind energy from qualified projects to the electric transmission system.
January 9, 2020 — Shark fins will be banned in New Jersey next year under a law signed Thursday by Gov. Phil Murphy.
The new law is designed to end the shark fin trade, which kills about 72 million sharks a year, primarily for soup, according to Humane Society International. Shark fin soup is a delicacy in Asia, but the method of making it poses a threat to the fish.
Sharks are caught and their fins are cut off while they are still alive — a practice known as shark finning — before being released back into the water to drown or bleed to death. At least 70 shark species are at risk of extinction because of the practice, according to the advocacy group Wild Aid.
Read the full story from the Trenton Bureau at NorthJersey.com
December 6, 2019 — Gov. Phil Murphy, who already will be remembered for launching New Jersey’s offshore wind energy future, recently more than doubled the state’s commitment to electricity from turbines in the Atlantic Ocean.
In June, when the state picked Ørsted U.S. Offshore Wind to develop its first wind farm off Atlantic City, its goal of producing 3,500 megawatts by 2030 was considered ambitious. Five months later, with climate activist Al Gore at his side, Murphy ordered the state to produce 7,500 MW by 2035. That would be enough to power 3.2 million homes.
The original goal was worthy and very timely, and this one is good too. But don’t assume that scaling up New Jersey’s wind energy will be easy or done well, or even at the reasonable cost of the first 1,100MW Ørsted will deploy by 2024.