Category: Events
Needed Lead Law, 4/2024
On April 22, construction exposure and prevention expert Michael Sharp, and Eve Gartner and Gabrielle Gonzales of EarthJustice joined Earth and Environment’s Rick Reibstein and others in discussing how law (defined broadly) can evolve to better enable society to prevent more unnecessary harm from the continued use and dispersion of lead.
Rick Reibstein: Needed Lead Law presentation 4.24
Earth Justice’s Lead Paint Right To Know Act: Lead Paint Right to Know Act
Michael Sharp: There Ought To Be A Law! 2024 (1)
Detoxifying Commerce
Students from local schools and environmental citizens concerned about toxics in our environment will convene on April 19 from 2-4 to hear from experts on how we can reduce toxics in our lives. Attendees will move from learned helplessness to agency by hearing about what can be done and how doable it is, and then having the chance to participate in breakout discussions of the Detox Agenda we need. A report on what people think that should be will be the result. Or, they can attend presentations on Environmental Data Utilization - understanding the mountains of data that can be mined to advance the social interest in bettering public and environmental health.
Register to attend by zoom: https://bostonu.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJUrduuhqj4jH9OOmgaOfC8BUq3s3MdaGJ6o
Register to come in person: email floyde@bu.edu with DETOX in the subject line. The event will be in Room 209 of the College of Communications, 640 Commonwealth Avenue.
Presenters: 2:00 - 4:00
Wilma Subra, independent scientist who has spent decades helping people who live near huge chemical plants in Louisiana.
Rachel Massey - former policy expert at the Toxics Use Reduction Institute, now with the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, winner of the 2022 Pollution Prevention Champion Award from the National Pollution Prevention Roundtable (NPPR).
Nick Ashford – Originator of the idea of technology options analysis, MIT professor of environmental law, author of many authoritative books and articles, advisor to governments, trainer of many who went on to great accomplishments in the environmental field.
Joel Tickner - founding Executive Director of the Association for the Advancement of Alternatives Assessment, founder of the Green Chemistry and Commerce Council (GC3), 2008 NPPR Pollution Prevention Champion.
Bev Thorpe - cofounder of the pioneering firm Clean Production Action, helping companies understand the value of transparency, helping them identify chemicals of concern and learn how to institute and conduct an active program of finding safer substitutes.
Kenneth Geiser - credited with the foundational ideas for the successful Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction Program, founder of the Toxics Use Reduction Institute and the Lowell Center for Sustainable Production, the Center for Environmentally Appropriate Materials, author of books and articles laying out the vision for how we may achieve a less toxic world.
Terri Goldberg - as Pollution Prevention director at the Northeast Waste Management Officials Association and then director of the organization Terri organized meetings and information helping the states of the northeast to learn from each other and to apply the prevention concept to their work. She helped launch national and regional programs on data, how to work with companies, providing an essential link between policymakers in Washington and state capitols, and people doing the work on the ground.
Swati Rayasam - Science Associate at the UCSF Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment and grassroots community organizer.
4:00 - 5:00 Participate in breakouts to refine the DETOX AGENDA - in person (students will show you where) or by zoom:
https://bostonu.zoom.us/j/99398248986?pwd=ZzlKTkNkci9GNXM2R00vaW50NW5Ldz09
or Remain in the Room (Zoom and Room 209) and Attend a Discussion of Environmental Data Utilization:
Chris Rascher, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 1 New England, on the Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act data.
The Office of Technical Assistance, Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, on OTA's interactive map of hazard sources, contamination, flood risk.
Flower Armijo, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 1 New England, former BU student, on citizen use of water quality data.
Katelyn Tarrio, Boston University's Earth and Environment Department, on creating as a BU student MassDEP's first map of contaminated sources and flood risk.
Jonathan Arentsen, former BU student, on the analysis of TSCA and TURA data he performed that won the 2022 Most Valuable Student award from the National Pollution Prevention Roundtable.
Organized by Rick Reibstein, formerly a manager of the Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction program and enforcement attorney for EPA, and creator of this project class, helped by Eden Floyd, Aubrey Hoes, and other students in Earth and Environment 538.
Presentations and Background (Powerpoints)
Toxics Release Inventory - Chris Rascher
Chloroprene Air Emissions From DuPont and Denka Facilities-Wilma Subra (1)
Nick Ashford Alternatives Analysis incorporating innovation
Cleaner Production Action_BevThorpe_BU_April19
Joel. Forward looking policy to address the toxics crisis and drive safer chemistry - BU 4-23
2023_ Phenol in Massachusetts Project Summary
https://www.bu.edu/rccp/files/2016/12/Waste_Site_Vulnerability.pdf
Accelerating the Transition to Lead-free Skies
National Zoom conference December 15, 2022, noon - 3, with participants representing communities affected by lead emissions, aircraft users, airport managers, and federal and local government. Constructive engagement concerning a powerfully charged topic produced a vision of an alignment of interests (cleaner engines, cleaner skies) around the elimination of lead.
View a factsheet (updated 11/23): Leaded Avgas-3
View the conference here: https://mymedia.bu.edu/media/t/1_9e74ni5a
View the program here: Program_Transition-to-Lead-Free-Skies-2022.12.15_Final
Solicitation of Ideas to Share at Accelerating the Transition to Lead-Free Skies
The Boston University class, “Research for Environmental Agencies and Organizations,” and the nonprofit Quiet Communities, Inc., have organized this conference to focus attention on an opportunity to accelerate the transition to unleaded aviation fuels for piston-powered aircraft. Industry has committed to a 2030 phase-out of 100LL leaded fuel, but seven years is too long a time for affected communities.
We invite you to submit your ideas about how this transition can be accelerated, recognizing the need for: adequate and interchangeable lead-free fuel alternatives, regulatory approvals, sufficient manufacturing, storage, and distribution capacities, and possibly, economic incentives. A useful background article by Isabel Goyer appears in Plane & Pilot magazine.
Specific questions to consider are:
- What tools of governance and what private actions should we immediately engage to speed the transition?
- How can we best combine strategies for most rapidly deploying new fuels?
- Where are the bottlenecks and how can we eliminate them?
- What strategic assistance and funding is available?
- What new infrastructure is needed?
- What overarching principles need to be kept in mind as we move forward as quickly as we can, to lead-free skies?
- What other questions should we be asking?
Please send your ideas – no more than one page, please – to: rreibste@bu.edu, with “Avgas” in the Subject line. The ideas will be summarized and presented in a report.
Quiet, Clean Land Care
The Quiet Transition: Leading by Example in Quiet, Clean Land Care, December 16, 2021. A project of Jamie Banks of Quiet Communities and Rick Reibstein of Boston University, assisted by Senior Matt Tate of the BU class "Research for Environmental Agencies and Organizations (CAS EE 538)". Presentations by: Christine Scalera, Deputy Town Attorney of Southampton, NY; Michael Cacciotti, Mayor of South Pasadena, CA; Stewart Welch, Mayor of Mountain Brook, Alabama; Lisa Macdonald and Sasha Nair, Co-chairs of Larchmont Environmental Committee, NY; Nina Orville, Ex. Director of Sustainable Westchester, NY; Elizabeth Schmitt, Legislative Aide with California Assemblymember Marc Berman; Michelle Ciccolo, Massachusetts State Representative, and John Liu, NY State Senator.
