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Date: 7/12/2023
SPRINGFIELD — Springfield City Council President Jesse Lederman and Ward 3 City Councilor Melvin Edwards traveled to the Statehouse in Boston to testify in front of the House Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities and Energy on June 28 in support of legislation filed by state Rep. Orlando Ramos (D-Springfield) and state Sen. Adam Gomez (D-Springfield) that would remove biomass incinerators from the list of incentivized fuel sources purchased by municipal light plants — local energy boards mostly existing in smaller, suburban Massachusetts communities.
“From the steps of City Hall to the City Council Chamber, the halls of the Statehouse and even the federal government — I’ve been proud to stand together with residents and advocates across our city to make clear that the days of polluters being rubber stamped in Springfield are over,” Lederman said. “Together we’ve ensured this long-proposed incinerator’s state and local permits were revoked, outlawed the burning of construction and demolition debris in our city, and beaten back multiple attempts by their powerful lobbyists to introduce new state incentives to fund their pollution.”
The State House News Service reported that the state standard requires all 40 municipal lighting plants to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2050, but allows the use of renewable energy — currently including biomass fuel.
“This particular challenge dates back to 2020 and the well-intentioned attempt to bring municipal light plants into compliance with the commonwealth’s goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through an omnibus climate bill. However, the original inclusion of biomass as a so-called non-carbon emitting source in that effort was, and remains, scientifically inaccurate and a dangerous end-run around the already established rules process that governs the renewable portfolio standard normally applied to these types of initiatives,” Lederman said.
The proposed incentive is like one that has been “long opposed” in East Springfield, Lederman explained. Springfield’s involvement with biomass dates back to the controversial Palmer Renewable Energy proposal for that neighborhood that resulted in years of debate and advocacy before the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection’s decision to block the development was upheld by the Massachusetts Office of Appeals and Dispute Resolution in November 2022. The Springfield City Council also adopted a resolution opposing the plant in 2020.
Lederman was closely involved in the 2020 effort to block the inclusion of biomass in the state’s expansive climate bill, resulting in a five-year moratorium on the proposal.
“Today, that moratorium is a ticking time bomb threatening the public health and environment of my constituents in the city of Springfield,” Lederman testified. “Even though the proposed incinerator in Springfield has been stripped of its state and local permits and remains ineligible for other state incentives through the renewable portfolio standard, its developers continue to challenge those decisions in court and have courted contracts with [master limited partnerships] if the incinerator is allowed to be constructed.”
Lederman told Reminder Publishing that he was against the proposed biomass incinerator before even being elected to the City Council.
He went on to say that there have been studies done to show that biomass incinerators are not a renewable energy source, whereas others are.
“This proposal should’ve never gotten this far,” he said. In its early days, Lederman noted that there was support from city officials before others came in to “sound the alarm.” He shared that it “pushed” him to run for office and continue to work “in the best interest of the community.”
Some of Lederman’s work in addressing the issue as a city councilor has included securing legal counsel from the Conservation Law Foundation to strongly challenge the incinerator’s local permits, soliciting support from state Sen. Edward Markey (D-Malden) to successfully challenge the incinerator’s state air permit in 2021 and developing a public petition that accumulated over 7,000 signatures in opposition to the state biomass incentives.
“The history of the effort to stop this biomass incinerator is a cautionary tale of what can happen when elected officials aren’t paying attention or aren’t acting in the best interest of their constituents. But it is also evidence of the power we have as a community to stand up and demand change, even when the powers that be might tell us it’s too late. They said we’d never stop this incinerator. We did,” Lederman said.
He noted that several others testified in favor of the bill. Now, it will go through the state legislation process, which Lederman said they will continue to monitor.
“We have stood united in defense of our community from this threat, and Council President Lederman has been steadfast and unyielding in the effort, no matter the barriers that emerged,” said Edwards in a written statement.
The State House News Service also reported that a second bill before the committee, also filed by Gomez and Ramos, seeks to close a loophole under which biomass facilities can still get state support. Under the climate law passed last year, biomass is still eligible for credits under the “Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard” program, meant to reward facilities that generate “clean heat.”
Reminder Publishing reached out to Edwards for additional comment but did not hear back as of press time.