Senator Brenner, Representative Tucker, and members of the Joint Standing Committee on Environment and Natural Resources, my name is Sarah Nichols, and I am the Sustainable Maine Director for the Natural Resources Council of Maine (NRCM). I appreciate this opportunity to testify in strong support of LD 1639. The time has come for Maine to Read More
landfills
Recognizing the Unjust, Disproportionate Health Impacts of Our Waste System
There is more to our waste crisis than meets the eye as a new United Nations (UN) report makes clear. The study, released by the United Nations Environment Program and the environmental justice nonprofit Azul shows that at every stage of the life-cycle for plastics – from production to disposal — there are significant human Read More
Top 5 Take-Aways from Maine’s Latest Waste and Recycling Report
The Sustainable Maine team at the Natural Resources Council of Maine (NRCM) is laser-focused on three bills that will make a huge difference in addressing serious problems and troubling trends with our recycling and landfilling system. Maine people want to do the right thing for the environment, but we need better policies in place if Read More
News & Noteworthy — January 2021
Read the latest news stories and opinion pieces related to the environment, including Maine’s air, land, water, and wildlife, in this month’s News & Noteworthy from the Natural Resources Council of Maine. January 28, 2021 Yesterday, President Biden announced a series of climate-related executive orders, and NRCM applauded this effort, which will benefit Maine’s environment Read More
News & Noteworthy — December 2020
Read the latest news stories and opinion pieces related to the environment, including Maine’s air, land, water, and wildlife, in this month’s News & Noteworthy from the Natural Resources Council of Maine. December 30, 2020 We start with news about the delay in Maine’s statewide plastic bag and foam bans, which have had enforcement delayed Read More
News & Noteworthy — October 2020
Read the latest news stories and opinion pieces related to the environment, including Maine’s air, land, water, and wildlife, in this month’s News & Noteworthy. October 29, 2020 Portland Press Herald op-ed: Cities, States Leading the Way in Combating Climate Crisis NRCM Sustainable Maine Director Sarah Nichols is quoted in this article: EPR-style Legislation Increasingly Draws Read More
Mainers Call for Greater Protections at State-owned Landfills
News release (September 16, 2020) — A group of Maine residents and the Penobscot Nation will call on the Board of Environmental Protection (BEP) at their September 17th meeting to support a citizen’s petition that will ban out-of-state waste from being disposed in State-owned landfills and enact greater environmental justice protections for those communities directly Read More
Why You Should Care about Landfills
There’s a hidden climate villain in Maine that you might not know about, and it’s where about 75% of our total waste goes. According to the U.S. EPA, landfills are the third-largest source of human-related methane emissions in the United States.[1] Pound for pound, methane has about 30 times more atmospheric heat-trapping capability than carbon Read More
NRCM Testimony in Support of LD 988, An Act To Reduce the Landfilling of Municipal Solid Waste
Senator Carson, Representative Tucker, and members of the Joint Standing Committee on Environment and Natural Resources, my name is Sarah Lakeman and I am the Sustainable Maine Project Director for the Natural Resources Council of Maine (NRCM). I appreciate this opportunity to testify in support of LD 988, which would help Maine’s waste policy better Read More
