Pennsylvania Legacies

Nobody knows exactly how many orphaned oil and gas wells dot the Pennsylvania landscape, but even conservative estimates put the number well into the hundreds of thousands. Every day these defunct facilities remain unplugged, they’re emitting greenhouse gases, contaminating groundwater, and compromising air quality. Their owners are nowhere to be found, leaving the Commonwealth holding the bag and largely unable to meet the costs of remediation. The recently introduced REGROW Act would provide billions of federal dollars for orphan well cleanup across the U.S. What would it mean for Pennsylvania? Analysis from Adam Peltz, Senior Attorney with Environmental Defense Fund.

In 1971, Pennsylvania became the first state to guarantee citizens' rights to clean air, pure water, and a healthy environment. Fifty years later, the state legislator who led the campaign for Pennsylvania's Environmental Rights Amendment is taking it to the next level. In his new book, Franklin Kury makes the case for a federal constitutional amendment to meet the unprecedented threat of climate change.

For most of its history in academia, ecological studies has been centered on STEM disciplines. But an emerging interdisciplinary movement is opening the environmental field to new scholarly approaches and bringing new voices into the discussion. PEC’s Lily Jones speaks with John MacNeill Miller, a professor of English literature at Allegheny College, about his work exploring the link between humans and non-human systems through a cultural lens.

As Pennsylvania weighs a new DEP rule that would expand leak detection and repair requirements for oil and gas producers, there's new research on the integrity of relatively low-producing "stripper" wells. Such facilities would remain exempt under Pennsylvania's current rulemaking, but a University of Cincinnati study suggests they're among the leakiest well sites in Appalachia. We speak with the author, Dr. Amy Townsend-Small.

The 2021 Wild & Scenic Film Festival On Tour lands in Pennsylvania on March 18, with virtual screenings handpicked for local audiences by PEC's affiliate, the Pennsylvania Organization for Watersheds and Rivers (POWR). We chat with the makers of this year's featured selection, "A Community Conservation Effort," about Kentucky's Greenspace, Inc.

2020 was the year our relationship with trails changed forever. A look inside PEC's newly updated research on how the COVD-19 pandemic has impacted trail use across Pennsylvania, and where we go from here.

Pittsburgh's rivers made the city an industrial titan at a time when environmental damage was accepted as the price of progress. Now they're being put back to work generating low cost, carbon-free electricity -- without creating new environmental or land use impacts. Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald and Paul Jacob of Rye Development join us for a conversation on low-impact hydropower, and why the County's recently announced investment in a 17.8 MW hydro facility on the Ohio River is only the beginning.

All over the country, consumers want locally grown food. But much of the demand is concentrated in densely populated areas, where farmers have to compete with developers over a finite amount of arable land. Montgomery County has a solution: fully a third of its farmland will remain in agricultural use permanently, thanks to Montco's wildly successful Farmland Preservation Program. Administrator Stephen Zbyszinski joins us to celebrate a major milestone: 10,000 acres preserved, and counting!

Which of five finalists will be Pennsylvania's River of the Year for 2021? With less than a week remaining to vote, nominating watershed groups make their final pitch for your vote.

On its 100th anniversary, a new book explores the chain of unlikely historical events that gave us Presque Isle State Park. Authors David Frew and Jerry Skrypzak discuss the book, the Isle, and their hometown of Erie, PA.

Winners of the 2020 Northeast Environmental Partnership Awards and 2020 Western Pennsylvania Environmental Awards, in their own words.

After decades of struggle, Pittsburgh's Hazelwood neighborhood is poised for an economic comeback. The long-awaited redevelopment of Hazelwood's industrial riverfront has rekindled hopes for a brighter future -- but the neighborhood's resident historian says there's also much to celebrate about, and learn from, its past. Our series on the Hazelwood Green project continues in conversation with JaQuay Carter of the Greater Hazelwood Historical Society.

Celebrating ten years of the PEC Environment Ride in conversation with members of the 2020 team.

For the better part of a century, the Hazelwood neighborhood was one of Pittsburgh's most important industrial centers. That all changed with the 1997 closure of the LTV steel plant on the site now known as Hazelwood Green. Now, as a decades-long redevelopment effort gathers momentum, the neighborhood is reimagining its relationship with the Monongahela River. We discuss the future of Hazelwood's riverfront with Todd Stern of U3 Advisors, which is overseeing the project on behalf of property owner Almono LP. Along with PEC and others, U3 is working with residents and stakeholders to develop a community-focused vision for the site.

A reckoning over RGGI, outdoor recreation and COVID, bipartisan love for community solar, and clearing a path for E-bikes: Legal & Government Affairs VP John Walliser reviews the PEC policy agenda heading into what promises to be an eventful fall in Harrisburg.