Expanding the Renewable Energy Industry Through Tax Subsidies Using the Structure and Rationale of Traditional Energy Tax Subsidies

Just as the government invested in oil and gas, it must now invest in new energy sources. In a sense, Americans need history to repeat itself. This Note suggests that Congress should amend the United States Tax Code to further subsidize the renewable energy industry. Congress should use subsidies historically available to the oil and gas industries as a model in its amendments. These subsidies serve as a model for promoting the renewable energy industry because such subsidies were fundamental in facilitating the oil and gas industries’ dominance today. Ultimately, Congress must further subsidize the renewable energy industry to avoid the environmental and economic consequences of an economy based on traditional sources of energy. This Note recommends that renewable energy dominance is possible by amending the tax code to subsidize the renewable energy industry using the same subsidization rationales applied to the oil and gas industries

Shopping to save: green consumerism and the struggle for northern Maine

Between 2001 and 2003, Roxanne Quimby-then the sole owner of a natural personal-care products company named Burt' Bees-invested millions of dollars of her company' profits in tens of thousands of acres of forestland in northern Maine. Her intention was to donate that land to the United States government on behalf of a controversial national park proposed for the region-the Maine Woods National Park. Quimby' actions set off sharp debates between policy makers, environmentalists and residents of northern Maine. As this article suggests, those debates were informed in part by their association with green consumerism. When consumers purchase ‘environmentally friendly’ products like those made by Burt' Bees, they typically envision their actions as having positive consequences for places associated directly with the production and consumption of that product. In this case, however, profits from a green consumer product were reinvested outside its immediate commodity chain, thereby implicating green-consumer decisions in a politics of identity and landscape control beyond that product' lifecycle. This paper explores that process, suggesting that even the most well-intended consumer choices can carry social and environmental consequences into new and perhaps unexpected terrain. When we shop to save, we can never be quite certain of what it is that we are saving

Expanding the Renewable Energy Industry Through Tax Subsidies Using the Structure and Rationale of Traditional Energy Tax Subsidies

Just as the government invested in oil and gas, it must now invest in new energy sources. In a sense, Americans need history to repeat itself. This Note suggests that Congress should amend the United States Tax Code to further subsidize the renewable energy industry. Congress should use subsidies historically available to the oil and gas industries as a model in its amendments. These subsidies serve as a model for promoting the renewable energy industry because such subsidies were fundamental in facilitating the oil and gas industries’ dominance today. Ultimately, Congress must further subsidize the renewable energy industry to avoid the environmental and economic consequences of an economy based on traditional sources of energy. This Note recommends that renewable energy dominance is possible by amending the tax code to subsidize the renewable energy industry using the same subsidization rationales applied to the oil and gas industries

Cultivating Healthy Communities: Refugee Urban Farmers in Providence, RI: Report No. 2 of Land Conservation and Inequality Series

Urban farming programs for refugees have become more common across the U.S. (Jean, 2015). Access to agricultural space, whether community gardens or market farms, can lead to improved health for those who have faced forced displacement, violence, and difficulties associated with resettlement. Community gardens in particular offer a range of benefits to refugees, including improvements to physical and mental health, food security, and social support (e.g., Malberg Dyg, 2020). Community gardens also provide refugees with opportunities for economic development (e.g., Banulescu-Bogdan, 2020). However, access to agricultural space in a dense urban area is challenging, particularly for groups from marginalized backgrounds, such as refugees. To better meet the needs of refugee farmers in urban areas, it is critical to identify the barriers that impede access to agricultural space. This report explains the challenges and needs related to farmland access among a group of refugees in Providence, Rhode Island. This report comes from a larger study investigating inequality and environmental justice in the context of farm and open space conservation. Distributional Impacts of Farm and Open Space Conservation is funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (NIFA Award No. 2018-67024-27695). Principal investigator is Corey Lang in the Department of Environmental & Natural Resource Economics at the University of Rhode Island, with co-investigator Amy Ando in the Department of Agricultural Economics at the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign, and co-investigator Julie C. Keller in the Department of Sociology & Anthropology at the University of Rhode Island

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at New England Land Trusts: Report No. 1 of Land Conservation and Inequality Series

With over 1,200 organizations registered with the Land Trust Alliance (LTA 2021), land trusts are often viewed as successful models of market-based solutions to environmental and social problems. Yet, the role of these organizations in making open space and farmland accessible to groups from marginalized backgrounds remains unclear. This report (No. 1) discusses findings from interviews conducted in 2021 with key experts at 15 land trusts in New England. The goal of the research was to understand organizational engagement with diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) values, with a special emphasis on how land trusts facilitate access to land for underrepresented groups. Interviewees and organizations are referred to using pseudonyms throughout the report. This report comes from a larger study investigating inequality and environmental justice in the context of farm and open space conservation. Distributional Impacts of Farm and Open Space Conservation is funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (NIFA Award No. 2018-67024-27695). Principal investigator is Corey Lang in the Department of Environmental & Natural Resource Economics at the University of Rhode Island, with coinvestigator Amy Ando in the Department of Agricultural Economics at the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign, and co-investigator Julie C. Keller in the Department of Sociology & Anthropology at the University of Rhode Island

Spatially Resolved Spectroscopy of the E+A Galaxies in the z=0.32 Cluster AC114

We present spatially resolved intermediate resolution spectroscopy of a sample of twelve E+A galaxies in the z=0.32 rich galaxy cluster AC 114, obtained with the FLAMES multi-integral field unit system on the European Southern Observatory's VLT. Previous integrated spectroscopy of all these galaxies by Couch & Sharples (1987) had shown them to have strong Balmer line absorption and an absence of [OII 3727] emission -- the defining characteristics of the``E+A'' spectral signature, indicative of an abrupt halt to a recent episode of quite vigorous star formation. We have used our spectral data to determine the radial variation in the strength of Hdelta absorption in these galaxies and hence map out the distribution of this recently formed stellar population. Such information provides important clues as to what physical event might have been responsible for this quite dramatic change in star formation activity in these galaxies' recent past. We find a diversity of behaviour amongst these galaxies in terms of the radial variation in Hdelta absorption: Four galaxies show little Hdelta absorption across their entire extent; it would appear they were misidentified as E+A galaxies in the earlier integrated spectroscopic studies. The remainder show strong Hdelta absorption, with a gradient that is either negative (Hdelta equivalent width decreasing with radius), flat, or positive. By comparing with numerical simulations we suggest that the first of these different types of radial behaviour provides evidence for a merger/interaction origin, whereas the latter two types of behaviour are more consistent with the truncation of star formation in normal disk galaxies. It would seem therefore that more than one physical mechanism is responsible for E+A formation in the same environment.Comment: 15 pages, 10 figures, accepted MNRA